So we've had Texas and Oklahoma leave the Big 12 for the SEC ... then the ACC, Big Ten and Pac-12 form an alliance ... and now we've seen the Big 12's response.
Reportedly, the Big 12 will add BYU, Cincinnati, Houston and UCF in the coming weeks. The league will ultimately be back to a 12 team league.
No word if the league will split back into divisions and what that would look like if they did. Currently, the Big 12 (which is made up of ten schools) play a round robin schedule with the top two teams playing in the conference title game. At 12 schools, the round robin won't happen but it is up in the air how they'll move forward. A division format could look like this:
EAST: Cincinnati, Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State, UCF, West Virginia
WEST: Baylor, BYU, Houston, Oklahoma State, TCU, Texas Tech
Of course, the East schools would be shut out from having access to the Texas area, but that was how it was in the "old" Big 12 when Colorado and Nebraska were still members.
THE GOOD
Well, the Big 12 looks a lot better than it has over the last two months. For the eight remaining members, it showed their willingness to look for solutions together and that this isn't a fractured bunch. The schools they're adding have been recently successful football programs who bring in large markets. Houston, Cincinnati, Orlando and Salt Lake City are in the fold, with BYU's national program being the jewel of that bunch. This solidified Texas while introducing the Florida and Ohio markets for the Big 12.
This is also a huge win over the AAC. For weeks, there were rumblings that the AAC could extract Big 12 schools to come to them which could vault that league into becoming a power conference ... or at least one that matters when the 12-team playoff comes about. With the Big 12 taking away three of the AAC's biggest programs, that all but slams the door on that idea -- at least for now.
Let's look at basketball. Baylor is the defending national champion, Kansas is a blue blood, West Virginia is solid with Bob Huggins (who used to coach at Cincinnati), Oklahoma State just produced the 2021 top overall draft pick, Texas Tech was in the 2019 national championship game and Iowa State has been a solid program for quite some time. BYU has been really good during their time in the West Coast Conference, Houston was in the last Final Four, Cincinnati has been a decent program with two national championships in their history while UCF challenged the Zion Williamson Duke team in the 2019 tournament.
Of course, this is all about football and while none of these schools bring with it the brands of Texas and Oklahoma, they can be great additions to the Big 12.
THE BAD
There are still some concerns, though. For one, the league will stretch geographically from Salt Lake City, Utah to Orlando, Florida -- three time zones. Obviously there could be some issue to the commonality of the member schools, though we've pretty much haven't cared too much about that of late.
There's also the question of if these four schools can keep playing at their current level one they step up in competition. You could point to Utah and TCU as prime examples of schools taking a dip before finding their footing to push against that theory. There are also schools like Miami, Nebraska and Colorado that get into new leagues and didn't find the same level of success.
The main issue, though, will be the individual goals of these schools. Right now, everyone is all in on keeping the Big 12 alive and well ... but what happens when one of the other power leagues start sniffing around? Say the Big Ten does try to go after Kansas and Iowa State -- you better believe those two will jump immediately at the chance for a more secure situation. The Alliance has pledged not to poach each other, but the Big 12 isn't part of that group and will be the store these leagues would likely go shopping in if they want to expand. For the last two months, the eight remaining schools have run concurrent plans of protecting the Big 12 as well as looking for a safe landing spot elsewhere.
Say that does happen where the doomsday scenario of Kansas and Iowa State leave for the Big Ten, West Virginia and Cincinnati for the ACC and Oklahoma State and some Texas schools leave for the Pac-12. The Big 12 won't be able to just pull from the AAC and other sources to field a league anymore, and we could see the AAC as the aggressor. Remember the folly of the Big East about 20 years ago when they lost Miami, Boston College and Virginia Tech, then lost Syracuse, Pittsburgh, Rutgers, West Virginia, etc several years later and then started reaching for schools to add that the entire thing fell apart. That could happen here if the ACC, Big Ten, Pac-12 or SEC decide to expand.
THE VERDICT
This is a very positive move for the Big 12 and the four schools they are inviting. The things that fall under my "bad" category are things that aren't really exacerbated by expanding and could happen no matter what the Big 12 does.
Hopefully this is the move that saves the Big 12 from extinction. This has been a solid league for 25 years now and it would be a shame to see it broken up (it's already a shame to see Texas and Oklahoma leave). Adding BYU, Cincinnati, Houston and UCF doesn't guarantee greatness but there is potential for any or all of them to step into a bigger spotlight with being in a power conference. After all, they've all done so in smaller leagues. BYU does have a national championship, Cincinnati was in the Big East and Houston in the SWC so they aren't going into this blind.
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