When the Big East was heavily involved with expansion discussions, suddenly the ACC surprised everyone by inviting Syracuse and Pitt, followed shortly by the Big XII invite of West Virginia. Eventually Louisville followed to the ACC.

I have to wonder if the P5 would prefer to keep their number at 65 or less rather than to have that number grow further. I suspect that the expansion talks within the Big XII could trigger a new round of expansion by the other 4.

1. A reemergence of the Pac-12 plan to expand into Texas/Oklahoma.
2. Big Ten and SEC cherry pick 2 apiece from the Big XII.
3. The ACC takes 1 more.

That drops the P5 (65) to a P4 (64). In such a scenario, there would be one or more Big XII members on the outside looking in. Expansion candidates would not only include current Big XII members but AAC members as well.

What the Pac 12 is looking for:


http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2014/dec/...ticle-copy

Quote:Tom Hansen, who was commissioner of the Pac-10 for 26 years before his retirement in 2009, is also wary of the idea of a waiver.

“Others have had to meet the requirements for a playoff,” Hansen said. “So why give a free pass to them?”

Given the upheaval that expansion brings, the Big 12 is unlikely to make any moves until it sees how the waiver process plays out. If it is denied, there will be mounting pressure to add teams and bring back a championship game (which the Big 12 had from 1996 until 2010, when other conferences began to rob it of members).

So what do conferences look for when they consider expansion? And how does SDSU — with its top-25 basketball team, improving football program and No. 28-ranked television market — stack up?

Unfortunately, there’s no cut-and-dried formula.

“Everyone is unique; not one shoe fits all,” Waters said.

For some conferences, TV money trumps all else.

Hansen got a taste of the expansion dance in the mid-1990s, when the Pac-10 courted Texas and Texas A&M. The Pac-10’s priorities were clear: Any prospective member had to be a major research university, bring the potential for additional TV revenue by expanding the conference’s footprint, and be geographically accessible to the rest of the league’s membership for ease of travel.

Even though the Pac-10 entertained overtures from SDSU, Hansen said the school was never seriously in the running.

There isn't a true magical number that the P5 has to get to.....it doesn't need to be 64 or 60 or anything like that.

Within the PAC, ACC, B1G, SEC there are 53 schools. If they pull Texas, TT, Oklahoma, OSU and Kansas it that will be 58 schools.

The B12 can then go out and add New Mexico, Tulane, Cincinnati, Memphis, Houston, Colorado St, BYU and get to 12. They would more or less be a true tweener conference with a TV deal approaching 1/2 the value of the P5 like the old BE football conference did compared to the other BCS conferences.

The AAC then can go for UTSA, Rice, Ohio, Army to stick with their expansion themes and become more of an East Coast based conference with UConn, Army (2 hours from the East Coast), Temple, Ohio (5 hours from the East Coast), Navy, ECU, USF, UCF. Rice for academics, UTSA to backfill for Houston. It would not be as good of a conference as the B12.

The MWC brings in NMSU and UTEP. UTEP by then will only have North Texas in CUSA so would 100% welcome a move.

The MAC brings Marshall back in as a replacement for Ohio which they agree to because of the easy travel.

CUSA down to 9 schools but only 3 in the West adds ULL, AState and Texas St to go with UNT, La Tech and So Miss. CUSA then would be at a nice even 12.

SBC down to 7/6 all sport. Liberty and EKU are the only ones still interested in the SBC all sports. UMass FB only to get the conference back to 10 FB members.

Then you have a P4 with 58 schools in it and then a G6 with 72 schools. The G6 force a 2nd autobid and playoff expansion to 8 teams/8 NYW games.

I think the only way the BigXII can go away is if the B1G/SEC raid the ACC.

Even if the ACC were to lose UVA/VT/UNC/NCST, it still has: Miami, FSU, GT, Clemson, WF, Duke, Pitt, Cuse, Louisville, and Boston College. I think a lot of people would predict FSU/Clemson to the BigXII in this scenario, but frankly, the 10 ACC leftovers are still a better foundation for a balanced multi-market conference than the current BigXII. In this scenario, the ACC is also weakened enough that WVU, Oklahoma State, Baylor, TCU, KSU, ISU would be reasonable ACC additions thereby making complete dissolution of the BigXII possible.

The Big XII will be just fine as long as Texas is happy.

The only way the B12 goes away is if there is some collusion and 6 of the 10 are set up to switch conferences and they vote to dissolve. Even if the biggest 4 leave, the B12 will just cherry pick schools from the AAC, MWC... who will intern pick schools from CUSA, MAC, SBC... which will eventually lead to the dissolving of one of those conferences.

As long as the B12 exists, they ride out their TV bowl contracts. Teams will still jump at the opportunity to join a Texas/Oklahoma-less B12 with those TV/Bowl $$.

(12-16-2014 10:49 AM)SublimeKnight Wrote:  The only way the B12 goes away is if there is some collusion and 6 of the 10 are set up to switch conferences and they vote to dissolve. Even if the biggest 4 leave, the B12 will just cherry pick schools from the AAC, MWC... who will intern pick schools from CUSA, MAC, SBC... which will eventually lead to the dissolving of one of those conferences.

As long as the B12 exists, they ride out their TV bowl contracts. Teams will still jump at the opportunity to join a Texas/Oklahoma-less B12 with those TV/Bowl $$.

I don't know if the Sugar Bowl will keep the Big 12 without Texas or Oklahoma.

(12-16-2014 10:46 AM)Maize Wrote:  The Big XII will be just fine as long as Texas is happy.

There are times when I wonder if keeping Texas happy is really worth it. I know they make obscene amounts of money. But isn't some of that a result of being in a conference with Oklahoma? Would Texas be as valuable a property if they were on their own as an independent? Or if they were just a middle of the pack team in the SEC West?

If the other Big 12 schools grew a spine and voted to expel Texas, where would they go? I'm assuming that such a vote would have to include some iron clad provision preventing any other Big 12 school from joining Texas in another conference for a fairly long time. Would the B1G invite them as a geographic outlier? Would they give them a sweetheart deal? Would the SEC want them and their giant ego? It's not like that league needs the headaches that the Big 12 has lived with, and they have three members who know that ego first hand.

Would losing Texas hurt recruiting for the rest of the Big 12? Or would it help?

Conventional wisdom says that Texas is on a par with Notre Dame in terms of its national appeal. I'm just not so sure that would be true for long unless Texas starts winning big again, and that's no sure thing IMO.

(12-16-2014 11:03 AM)MWC Tex Wrote:  

(12-16-2014 10:49 AM)SublimeKnight Wrote:  The only way the B12 goes away is if there is some collusion and 6 of the 10 are set up to switch conferences and they vote to dissolve. Even if the biggest 4 leave, the B12 will just cherry pick schools from the AAC, MWC... who will intern pick schools from CUSA, MAC, SBC... which will eventually lead to the dissolving of one of those conferences.

As long as the B12 exists, they ride out their TV bowl contracts. Teams will still jump at the opportunity to join a Texas/Oklahoma-less B12 with those TV/Bowl $$.

I don't know if the Sugar Bowl will keep the Big 12 without Texas or Oklahoma.

True can see them in that scenario going to the Orange Bowl model with a B1G/Big XII alliance.

(12-16-2014 10:49 AM)SublimeKnight Wrote:  The only way the B12 goes away is if there is some collusion and 6 of the 10 are set up to switch conferences and they vote to dissolve. Even if the biggest 4 leave, the B12 will just cherry pick schools from the AAC, MWC... who will intern pick schools from CUSA, MAC, SBC... which will eventually lead to the dissolving of one of those conferences.

As long as the B12 exists, they ride out their TV bowl contracts. Teams will still jump at the opportunity to join a Texas/Oklahoma-less B12 with those TV/Bowl $$.

It takes 8 votes to dissolve the conference, not 6.

(12-16-2014 10:46 AM)Maize Wrote:  The Big XII will just exist as long as Texas is happy.

FTFY

A pac 20 with 7-8 big 12 school's would solve a lot of issues + put wvu in a 16-18 team acc with uconn and cincy. Thus, you would have 4 main feeders, big 10, sec, acc, and pac 20 into the playoffs.

(12-16-2014 11:11 AM)ken d Wrote:  If the other Big 12 schools grew a spine and voted to expel Texas, where would they go? I'm assuming that such a vote would have to include some iron clad provision preventing any other Big 12 school from joining Texas in another conference for a fairly long time.

Even in the unlikely scenario that such a vote would happen, I cannot imagine a few teams would vote for the second one, since if Texas did join another conference, it would create openings that other teams simply may not want to pass up for fear of being the last one on the ship.

(12-16-2014 12:43 PM)adcorbett Wrote:  

(12-16-2014 11:11 AM)ken d Wrote:  If the other Big 12 schools grew a spine and voted to expel Texas, where would they go? I'm assuming that such a vote would have to include some iron clad provision preventing any other Big 12 school from joining Texas in another conference for a fairly long time.

Even in the unlikely scenario that such a vote would happen, I cannot imagine a few teams would vote for the second one, since if Texas did join another conference, it would create openings that other teams simply may not want to pass up for fear of being the last one on the ship.

Not only is it unlikely to happen, it simply can't happen because it would be in violation of the league by-laws. Check them, they're available on line.

No conference can simply vote to kick a member out without cause. If they could, there would be no point in joining a conference.

(12-16-2014 08:59 AM)Kittonhead Wrote:  There isn't a true magical number that the P5 has to get to.....it doesn't need to be 64 or 60 or anything like that.

Within the PAC, ACC, B1G, SEC there are 53 schools. If they pull Texas, TT, Oklahoma, OSU and Kansas it that will be 58 schools.

The B12 can then go out and add New Mexico, Tulane, Cincinnati, Memphis, Houston, Colorado St, BYU and get to 12. They would more or less be a true tweener conference with a TV deal approaching 1/2 the value of the P5 like the old BE football conference did compared to the other BCS conferences.

The AAC then can go for UTSA, Rice, Ohio, Army to stick with their expansion themes and become more of an East Coast based conference with UConn, Army (2 hours from the East Coast), Temple, Ohio (5 hours from the East Coast), Navy, ECU, USF, UCF. Rice for academics, UTSA to backfill for Houston. It would not be as good of a conference as the B12.

The MWC brings in NMSU and UTEP. UTEP by then will only have North Texas in CUSA so would 100% welcome a move.

The MAC brings Marshall back in as a replacement for Ohio which they agree to because of the easy travel.

CUSA down to 9 schools but only 3 in the West adds ULL, AState and Texas St to go with UNT, La Tech and So Miss. CUSA then would be at a nice even 12.

SBC down to 7/6 all sport. Liberty and EKU are the only ones still interested in the SBC all sports. UMass FB only to get the conference back to 10 FB members.

Then you have a P4 with 58 schools in it and then a G6 with 72 schools. The G6 force a 2nd autobid and playoff expansion to 8 teams/8 NYW games.

what did you mean here? Army isnt 2 hours from east coast

The Big 12 has a choice - hang around a few more years at 10 and get cherry-picked...

or expand to 12-14 NOW.

They will do the former because they are idiots.


If you really wanted to open things up, you bring in SDSU (which is a Top 100 academic program and Top 50 football/Top 25 basketball) and gets you into So Cal. Bring in BYU for a semi-national power, add Col St and NM as bridges out west, and you have a reasonable 14 team conference w/ a highly competitive championship game.

WEST: SDSU/BYU/NM/CSU/TTCH/TCU/TEX
EAST: OU/OSU/KU/KSU/ISU/BAY/WVU

How bout you and Oklahoma deal with your tag along situations and come over to the PAC together?

(12-16-2014 08:04 AM)Melky Cabrera Wrote:  1. A reemergence of the Pac-12 plan to expand into Texas/Oklahoma.
2. Big Ten and SEC cherry pick 2 apiece from the Big XII.
3. The ACC takes 1 more.

1. I think the PAC 12 would want UT to be a part of that plan...without Texas, its not going to happen. It would be interesting to see if the PAC 12 ever looked at other Texas teams though....maybe Rice and someone. Would that add to the bottom dollar? Texas markets are lucrative

2. I think the only schools the B1G would be interested in are Kansas and Texas. UT isn't going to the B1G anytime soon. If the B1G could get Virginia to come aboard, I could see them adding Virginia and Kansas as bookends

3. The ACC poses the real threat IMO, and it would be in terms of a similar type Notre Dame-esque deal for Texas: partial membership with a slate of ACC football games. I don't know the #s, but you've got to think that would boost the Longhorn network dramatically. If Texas were to up and leave the Big XII, I think it would be to the ACC where they could still have their network.

Everyone needs to quit trolling the Big 12:



bad things could happen