Texas A&M to SEC

those non-conference games are going to suck.

 

The west coasters who don't want anything to do with Lubbock, Stillwater, & Norman, or the schools there, which as far as I can tell is pretty much everybody in terms of the former two....

 

Lubbock, maybe. But 3 different Pac10 teams (WSU, UCLA, and AZ) have voluntarily played home-and-away series against OSU in the last decade. OU has played Washington, Oregon, and UCLA as well. So these Pac10 schools don't really seem to have too much problem with it. The more likely scenario is that you have a bunch of writers b****ing because they don't want to have to travel to those places to cover their teams.

 

Yeah, well I'm guessing trips to Albuquerque, Colorado Springs and Fresno offer less appeal considering those will be their new peers if they're left on the outside of the super-conference realignment.

 

Playing a roadie in Stillwater once every 10 years is one thing - doing it all the time, and degrading the Pac 12's academics as a result - is another.

 

still sounds like posturing but who knows at this point

 

Rice to Big 12?

http://www.everydayshouldbesaturday...iversity-weighs-in-on-conference-reallignment

 

They barely mention it, but they're really just afraid of Oklahoma State walking in as top-dog in wrestling and golf. :grin:

Besides, I've met girls from Arizona State and seen interviews with Oregon football players. Oklahoma State wouldn't be the dunces of the conference. (OU, maybe, but I digress.) It's the Pac-10/12/14/16. It's not the Ivy League.

 

Are we really going to try and sledgehammer academics into this? They're athletes, not Mathletes, and there's no way those holier-than-thou Pac12 schools are going to stick their noses in their 1892 collected works of Walt Whitman and let the college football landscape, and its 100s of millions of dollars in TV revenue, pass them. I mean, no use going to top academic colleges if you're administration is dumb enough to turn down endless wads of cash.

 

I like pods; though there is no way they will be would have a conference "semis" and then "finals" as it would likely increase games per year by 1, which everyone seems to be against and would give your best teams an additional loss making them less likely to get to good bowls outside the BCS.

There was idea I read about 4 pods but every year 2 pods are pair together. Once paired, a team would play all the other teams in those two pods (7 games), then they would have 1 game against a team from the other two pods (2 games) meaning 9 total games.

Now there can obviously be various to this such as pod pairing change every 2 years to allow for H/A between teams. But with this system you essentially allow for divisions that will have easy tiebreakers (every division team play each other), you have some exposure to all regions every year, and you play all the teams in the conference at least 1 every 3 years.

This way supposed you wanted to keep certain "permanent rivalries" between teams not in pods a-la SEC's permanent rivals, you could do that too with those 2 games for the other 2 pods.

I think the argument of the olympic sports is bunk. Currently a lot of those sports are school vs school, but it will simply be more cost effective and probably get more spectators to schedule those as invitationals with multiple schools participating in each one. That is how most higher level of those sports tend to work anyways, so it would make sense for most of those sports to follow suit.

Then it is not like the Big East has face horrible issues with their 20 basketball teams. If anything, it has made the conference's reputation and overall play stronger with the basketball part of the TV deal and more of the pie from the NCAA tournment due to more qualifiers and them progressing further.

Plus, they whole Colorado thing is pure spin. Neither it nor Utah borders the Pacific, and it is pure opinion that "it never fit in the Big 12" as if fits better with the Pac 12. Colorado is well Colorado. Does not really fit with either group, just whatever will it pay it more which is obviously the Pac 12.

 

A&M to the SEC finally moving forward. Straight from the commisioner's mouth:
http://www.secdigitalnetwork.com/NE...isioner-slive-talks-conference-alignment.aspx

Now to watch the fireworks.

 

if preserving the big 12 isn't an option, i like acc better than pac 12.

 

Gonna guess that was a 'WOOP'

 

That OB article seems to be updated a bit.

http://texas.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=1263940

Relevant part:


A contingent of University of Texas officials met with Oklahoma officials on Sunday afternoon, according to multiple sources, and the meeting didn't get very far.

According to sources, Texas wanted to talk about ways to solidify the Big 12, and OU officials didn't even want to discuss the Big 12. In the eyes of the OU board of regents, the Big 12 is dead, sources said.

"The conversation never even got to the Longhorn Network," one source close to the situation said. "It wasn't about UT's network or OU's network, it was about the OU board's concern for the instability in the Big 12 and how realignment can't happen every year."

The OU board of regents will meet within two weeks to formalize plans to withdraw from the Big 12 and apply for membership to the Pac-12, the source close to OU's administration said.

Messages left with OU athletic director Joe Castiglione and Oklahoma State athletic director Mike Holder were not immediately returned.


This could be interpreted two different ways:

(1) "We're sick of this and just moving on. Tired of putting bandaids on a dying conference."

(2) "If there were REAL stability, we'd be fine - TLN/etc is not a big deal."

The former is probably past the point of no return; the latter would leave an opening if Texas can find a solution.

 

Maybe Baylor was just trying to delay the inevitable and secure a seat in the Big East? I'm so ready to move on from this crap.

 

More from the meeting:

http://espn.go.com/college-sports/s...xas-longhorns-oklahoma-sooners-officials-meet

Only thing of note:

In the meeting, Texas expressed its desire to keep the Big 12 together, while OU made it clear it plans to pursue membership in the Pac-12. But according to an OU athletic department source, Sooner officials agreed to wait as Texas works through its next move.

It's OU's preference to go to the Pac-12 with the Longhorns, the source said, and OU is willing to wait for a short period of time while that remains a possibility before acting on its own.

 

acc! acc!

 

It's not me/us, it's what the Pac 12 folks are reportedly saying, and it goes both ways, Oklahoma thinks it can get AAU membership by associating with the Pac 12.....likewise they've shied away from the SEC for the exact same reasons despite it being a better fit in many other aspects.

 

Here's the latest on the Big10 stuff:

http://northwestern.rivals.com/showmsg.asp?fid=57&mid=162755759&sid=901&tid=162755759&style=1

If any of this is true (this guy supposedly has credibility, but who knows), it does fit with the OU stuff. Texas is trying to get into the Big10; OU is waiting on that. If it fails, Texas goes to the Pac10 along with OU; otherwise, OU goes on it's own.

One thing that really doesn't fit to me is the Big10 being OK with TLN. Supposedly, OSU and Michigan really had to be convinced to give rights to the Big10 Network - I don't know how happy they'd be about this, but who knows.

 

Hmm Big 12 falling apart. Not looking good for Baylor?