<p>
NCAA rules only allow a conference championship game if a league has 12 teams minimum.</p>
<p>
Baylor, Iowa State and Kansas State will continue to be on a conference death bed.</p>
<p>I think the Big Ten has done very well for itself, adding, over time, the 2 football powerhouses that made the most sense geographically and culturally. Passionate fans, too. Should ND signal in the future that it is prepared to join, it should be an easy matter to pick up a Pitt.
Those concerned that Nebraska is not up to snuff on the academics, get over it. Several Big Ten universities are similar on admissions, including Indiana, Purdue, Michigan State and Minnesota. And not too long ago, Ohio State.
The Pac-10 should be able to add Utah. How to fill division spots to set up a conference championship game is a bit problematic.
The loser, to me, is the Big 12. Texas, Oklahoma and eight dwarfs, and no league championship game. TCU, SMU and Houston, possible additions, would make the conference Texas centric rather than regional.</p>
<p>
Danas, the only fair way to do that is to split the northern CA schools from the southern CA schools…or the “zipper” method (break each team from its rival into different divisions, but they play each other each year). It’ll be interesting to see what happens.</p>
<p>Option A:
Northwest:
Berkeley
Stanford
Oregon
Oregon State
Washington
Washington State</p>
<p>Southwest:
UCLA
USC
Arizona
Arizona State
Colorado
Utah</p>
<p>Option B:
UCLA
Stanford
Arizona State
Utah
Oregon
Washington State</p>
<p>USC
Berkeley
Arizona
Colorado
Oregon State
Washington</p>
<p>[or something like that]</p>
<p>xiggi, it is my understanding, and I may be wrong here, that a conference must have at least 12 teams in order to have a championship game. Otherwise, why would the Pac 10 and Big 10 have expended their conference? </p>
<p>Secondly, my point was not that no program would be willing to join the Big XII, but rather, that the Big XII will not be able to replace Nebraska and Colorado that easily. Academically, Colorado was second to Texas. In terms of Football, losing Nebraska and Colorado would be akin to the Big 10 losing Michigan or Ohio State AND Wisconsin. What teams can the Big XII bring to the table that will generate the sort of revenues, competition and fan excitement that Colorado and Nebraska generated? My guess would be none.</p>
<p>TCU is the best they can get right now. Better sports than Colorado at present. Second school will be tough. SMU was very good at one time–for USC type reasons. But both have small followings. BYU would be deserving but has issues. Colorado State–meh. Is Texas State ready to move up?</p>
<p>SMU and TCU were in the old southwestern conference that blew up when the Big 12 was created … at that time they both chose to go to a smaller conference … given the new world (big TV bucks) I wonder if they would choose to step back up.</p>
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</p>
<p>What a load of horse manure. You do not transfer national championships from conference to conference.</p>
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</p>
<p>I misread the original point. Mixed being able to declare a conference champion and HAVING a championship game. Mea culpa!</p>
<p>The Southwest Conference began to falter after the defection of U of Arkansas to the SEC. Arkansas AD Frank Boyles rankled under the influence of UT in the SWC and was a smart guy financially. He had the foresight to recognize that there was $$ in the NCAA tournament, which is why Arkansas was the only SWC team to take men’s basketball seriously and ended up with more Final Four appearances than any other school from the south (aside from U of Houston, which didn’t join the the SWC until the late 1970s).</p>
<p>If the Big XII schools are smart, they’ll stay at 10 teams and try to get more revenue from attractive non-conference games (Oklahoma-Nebraska) or try to get an attractive ‘date’ like Texas Christian (games at Jerry Jones Statdium) or Illinois State (for basketball and to get into the Chicago TV market.</p>
<p>ESPN Rank 'Em: Big 12 vs. Pac-10 Prestige</p>
<p>[List</a> Ranker - Rank 'Em: Big 12 vs. Pac-10 Prestige - ESPN](<a href=“http://espn.go.com/sportsnation/rank?versionId=1&listId=672]List”>http://espn.go.com/sportsnation/rank?versionId=1&listId=672)</p>
<hr>
<p>Thompson: Utah AD, school not contacted by Pac-10
(AP) – 1 hour ago</p>
<p>HALF MOON BAY, Calif. — Mountain West Conference commissioner Craig Thompson says he was told Monday by Utah’s athletic director that the university had not been contacted by the Pac-10.</p>
<p>Thompson was attending a meeting of conference commissioners in northern California on Tuesday. Pac-10 commissioner Larry Scott was not in attendance.</p>
<p>Thompson says Scott has not contacted him since the Pac-10’s invitation to Texas was declined Monday. The Pac-10 was hoping to add the Longhorns and four other Big 12 schools to form a 16-team conference. But Texas and the rest decided to stay put. The Pac-10 is one member short of the 12 it needs to hold a football championship game.</p>
<p>Utah has been speculated as being the Pac-10’s next target.</p>
<p>Copyright © 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. </p>
<p>Link: <a href=“http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gFNWZjO4F4dTyX9HOOiyJXXeAtvwD9GBSSB80[/url]”>http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gFNWZjO4F4dTyX9HOOiyJXXeAtvwD9GBSSB80</a></p>
<p>Meant to say that Arkansas was the most successful basketball program in the southWEST.</p>
<p>Larry Scott is probably licking his wounds and regrouping.</p>
<p>
Those ranking results are more like “Football Only Prestige”</p>
<p>Well, that’s just your horse manure. PSU and NU are now proud members of the B10. Both added considerable football strength to the B10 and will going forward. The conference does not win the NC–a school does. Both schools decided to step up a level by joining the leading conference in the USA.</p>
<p>
Or smelly Bevo… ;)</p>
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</p>
<p>Oh well, Barrons, that is the beauty of forums. Everyone is entitled to his own set of opinions, even the erroneous type. Fwiw, you must have a strange appreciation of records and statistics in the last decades to believe the Big 10 is the leading conference in the nation. I guess we all can safely assume that in college football winning national championship is neither the yardstick nor the objective. It must be the size of the sausage links!</p>
<p>The B10 has the best overall combination of athletics, academics, college environment and overall financial success. People all over the US and the world flock to B10 schools.</p>
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</p>
<p>My mistake for thinking you were talking about football, given the context of this thread. I now understand that you are talking about an “overall combination of athletics, academics, college environment and overall financial success.” </p>
<p>Since each one of those elements is worthy of its lengthy debate, I see no need to argue about it. Perhaps on one point … I do not think that many schools in other conferences are having problems filling their classes. Is the average admit rate for the Big 10 that superlative? Are the academics better at Big 10 schools than at a conference that includes Cal, Stanford, UCLA, and USC? I have not looked at the numbers for the Big 10. For some reason, I’d think that Hawkette must have statistics for all conferences. Assuming UCLA or USC matches Michigan. Who do you have matching Stanford and Cal? Ohio State or Penn State? </p>
<p>Perhaps it is time to make another bet about admit and yield rates at Wisconsin. :)</p>
<p>xiggi, just like there is more to a university than undergraduate admission statistics, there is more to an athletic conference than football. :D</p>