is because of where the school gets its out-of-state students. In June or July 2014, JMU's President and AD gave interviews in the DN-R. During the interviews they both indicated that they would "prefer" to join a "northern" conference because majority of their out-of-state students come from the Mid-Atlantic and New England regions. So for most people that translate to the ACC, Big East/AAC, Big Ten, and MAC as being their only options.

You can exclude the ACC and Big Ten for obvious reasons. The AAC may even be kinda excluded because the conference has shifted west and doesn't seem to be interested in replacing Rutgers with another school from that part of the country. For the longest time the rumor was that Delaware and JMU may join the MAC. However, it broke down because Delaware wasn't ready to end its football rivalry with Villanova. Because the MAC doesn't appear to be interested in having football-only members (given what happen with UMass), I am not sure JMU has any interest in joining the MAC now. I believe JMU's ideal situation would be to be a football-only member in the MAC and full member of the A-10 for all other sports. The reason JMU probably doesn't want to be a full member in the MAC is Buffalo is the only MAC member in the Mid-Atlantic/New England region now.