The Big 12 expansion groundswell

[DU Ute]

Nah. Who cares how the Big [insert number] feels about CU leaving? We might feel bad if no one in the MWC cared that Utah is leaving, however.

[il Padrino Ute]

Stop it Ted, you're going to make some of the Ute Fans here feel bad.

Feel bad about Utah going to the PAC?

[Flattop]

Stop it Ted, you're going to make some of the Ute Fans here feel bad.

Now if we could just stop making Coug fans feel bad.

[U-Ute]

Stop it Ted, you're going to make some of the Ute Fans here feel bad.

Not me. I know where Utah sits in the college football landscape. We're the equivalent of seat fillers at the Oscars.

But, I really don't care how we got invited to the party.

U-Ute

[LA Ute]

Not me. I know where Utah sits in the college football landscape. We're the equivalent of seat fillers at the Oscars.

But, I really don't care how we got invited to the party.

U-Ute

(From others filling seats.)

[Uncle Ted]

It seems that the Big 12 may still have the expansion option on the table...

Assistant Big 12 Commissioner Bob Burda said coaches and administrators are working toward keeping the conference intact. Adding schools is a possibility, he said.

Too bad BYU dropped its wrestling program back in the 80's.

Edit: I guess BYU wrestling was around until 2000(?).

[SeattleUte]

It seems that the Big 12 may still have the expansion option on the table...



Too bad BYU dropped its wrestling program back in the 80's.

Edit: I guess BYU wrestling was around until 2000(?).

I guess we might find out if the brethren are right about their peception of the B12's deep respect for BYU's religious beliefs and practices (per Killer's intelligence lol)

[jay santos]

It seems that the Big 12 may still have the expansion option on the table...



Too bad BYU dropped its wrestling program back in the 80's.

Edit: I guess BYU wrestling was around until 2000(?).

Rondo had to drop it. It was one of the last things that made him quit.

[Uncle Ted]

Notre Dame coach believes more conference expansion will possibly happen as soon as next summer:

The hot topic of conference expansion cooled off considerably once Texas announced last month that the Longhorns would remain in the Big 12 for the long haul. (Or at least until a better offer than the one pieced together at the 11th hour materializes.)

That decision plugged the dam temporarily, according to Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly, who believes the next wave of high-dollar hysteria will soon roll in.

"I don't know that it's settled," Kelly told ESPNChicago.com last week at an alumni function in Grand Rapids, Mich. "I think it's probably safe for right now, but I don't believe that we're done with the shaking and the movement in college football."

Which means more tremors will rattle South Bend, possibly next summer.

"There's obviously a move toward super conferences," Kelly said. "We're going to have to see how that plays out. I know our athletic director Jack Swarbrick has every angle played and every back-up plan, if you will, looked at. So in case we have to do something, I think we're very, very well prepared. I'd say we're safe right now, but to answer the question truthfully, I think there's going to be some more movement here in the next year or so."

Kelly acknowledged that if the seismic shifts many expected would have played out, the game would have immediately changed for Notre Dame and its independent status.

"I think we can all surmise that if it became just super conferences, maybe that shadow would have been too large for us to stay on the sideline. I still think this is about television and I think it's still about finances and dollars that are still out there. A lot of that has to do with where you want your brand. Branding today for schools is so important."

[Uncle Ted]

It seems that Holmoe believes the Big 12-2 is pretty stable with 10 teams:

[Holmoe] said BYU is watching the stability of the Big 12 (-2). He dismissed the idea that if the new TV contract comes in significantly less than projected - which he believes it could for the Big 12 and Pac-10 - that it would throw a wrench in the 10 remaining schools' commitment to stay together.

And, also, believes that the Big 12-2 isn't sold on needing a conference championship game:

[Holmoe] said he believes many in the Big 12 do not want a football championship game because of what happened in the 2007 college football season, where Missouri beat Kansas to advance to the conference championship game, but Kansas received the BCS bowl bid because Missouri lost the championship game.

But seems to have his office door still open for the possibility:

As for the Big 12 possibly being interested in BYU down the road, if it ever chooses to replace Colorado and Nebraska and get back to 12 teams, Holmoe skirted those specific questions, saying it would be unwise to reveal any strategic positions at the current time.

Edit: Also:

Asked if there's been interest in BYU from other conferences, like the Big 12, Holmoe said, "The answer was no right now. Is the answer going to change? What do we do in the meantime? Can we show people a side they haven't seen or didn't know of? We're constantly trying to do that, which is exposure. We're working on (scheduling) games and we're doing as much as we can to make that happen."

But remember that "things may settle for a little bit, but there's opportunities—great opportunities for BYU that did not exist" before the recent conference expansions.

[Uncle Ted]

Add former Mizzou basketball coach, Norm Stewart, to the list of people concerned about the Big 12-2's stability:

"I think there is some concern," Stewart said. "Financially, when there is so many inequalities, you may have difficulty maintaining that."

[...]

"Right now, it seems to me there is quite a few financial difficulties, as far as an imbalance," Stewart said. "That could cause some problems."

On Nebraska going to the Big Ten:

The Tigers were thought to be a candidate for Big Ten expansion, but it was Nebraska that accepted an invitation to join earlier this summer.

"Tom Osborne just beat everybody to the draw," Stewart said of the Cornhuskers' athletic director. "The good-looking girl just winked at the other guys, but the quarterback won the battle."

[Uncle Ted]

Long live the new king:

Texas remained in the Big 12 for the same reason it considered jumping to the Pac-10. Money and greed were deep in the heart of this decision, evidenced by the fact that the country's most well-endowed public university stands to make between $20 million and $25 million in television revenue.

In doing so, Texas showed that it, not Notre Dame, is the new king.

It was a good move for the Longhorns but an even better move for college football. In staying put, the Longhorns might have saved the sport from those who were trying to ruin it, namely Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany and Pac-10 Commissioner Larry Scott.

Not that Delany won't keep trying to entice Notre Dame or a few Big East teams. The SEC still could raid the ACC. But for now, the upheaval that seemed imminent has been quashed.

Long live college football's new king.

Thank you, UT, for saving college football.

[Uncle Ted]

Besides the money, the downside of not having a conference championship in the Big 12:

College football expansion has been the big buzzword this past offseason, but that expansion will eliminate one of the sport's best divisions. The Big XII Conference South Division boasts national powers Texas and Oklahoma, along with the solid programs of Oklahoma State, Texas Tech and Texas A&M.

When Nebraska bolts to the Big Ten Conference after this season, and with Colorado scheduled to join the Pac-10 in 2012, the Big XII will have 10 teams and no conference title game. The powerful South Division will now be joined by the weaker teams in the North Division. Without a conference championship game, Texas and Oklahoma might have a tougher time capturing a national title with a diminished Bowl Championship Series ranking.

[Donuthole]

Besides the money, the downside of not having a conference championship in the Big 12:

I've said that all along. In the last decade, twice a 1-loss USC team was the best team in the country and was left out of the BCS title game because it didn't have that extra game at the end of the season to boost its BCS rating. They got fortunate with an AP-Coaches poll split in 2003, but in 2008 they got snubbed again. And they likely would have been snubbed in 2006, but their inability to tackle Patrick Cowan made the point moot.

[Red Legger]

Where did you dig up that old fossil, Norm Stewart? A noodling tournament down in Cooter Missoura? Missoura sowed a small breeze lifting her skirt to the Big 10 and reaped a dam Whirlwind. Of course, those stupid nincompoops are used to little bitty political manuverings getting a bit outta control. In the immortal words of Cap'n Osawatomie Brown to the guard at the Federal Armory in Harpers Ferry Virginia:

"I came here from Kanzas, and this is a slave State; I want to free all the negroes in this State. Otherwise, I mean to burn the town and have blood."

A word of advice: never, ever listen to a Missourian talking about matters outside of fireworks, walnut bowls and the various XXX venues available along I-70 in the Show Me State. They don't know what they're talking about and will just cause trouble.

'Kansas farmers should raise less corn and more hell.'-Mary Lease, 19th century Kansas Populist

Rock Chalk Jayhawk, Beat Mizzou