West Virginia to Big 12

West Virginia will be joining the Big 12. Assuming Missouri's move to the SEC finally comes to fruition, the Big 12 will settle at 10 teams. As shown in the map below, WVU is geographically distant from all the other Big 12 schools. I heard someone on the radio say that the closest Big 12 school to West Virginia is Iowa State. According to the distance calculator at Travel Math, Morgantown, West Virginia and Ames, Iowa are 734 miles apart.

Whether the Mountaineers and the existing Big 12 schools will be able to strike up compelling rivalries in football or other sports anytime soon, I don't know. Count me as skeptical.

Big East Considering Boise State

The Big East is in such a mess, it's considering adding... [wait for it...] ... Boise State! I know that geographic compactness already has been degraded as a criterion for forming conferences, but placing an Idaho school with ones in New Jersey, Connecticut, and Florida seems a little much.

Big 12 Remains in Flux

The Big 12 remains in flux, but we're getting some ideas of where things may be heading. Texas Christian University (TCU) looks like it will be joining the Big 12. This means that TCU will be leaving the Big East before it has even played a game in that league. TCU, temporarily at least, will bring the Big 12's number of teams back to 10, after Texas A&M's move to the SEC.

Another Big 12 school, Missouri, seems to be in a holding pattern regarding whether it will join Texas A&M in moving to the SEC. According to this article: "The Missouri Tigers are still on the fence if they want to stay in the Big 12 or pack up and head to the SEC. However, Missouri may not have the necessary votes to join the SEC."

A Missouri departure (assuming no glitches with TCU's arrival) would take the Big 12 back to nine members. Who might be leading contenders for a new tenth team? Brigham Young University (BYU) seemed likely to join the Big 12 at one point, but the chances seem to be fading at the moment.

Louisville continues to be mentioned, with the possible demise of Big East football giving the Cardinals reason to look elsewhere. A move to the Big 12 would also create for Louisville a basketball rivalry with fellow elite hoops program Kansas. On the downside, however, Louisville is geographically distant from the existing Big 12 schools, between roughly 500-1,000 miles away, according to Travel Math. Louisville, being a city school, would also seem to lack cultural ties to the other Big 12 schools, many of which are in more rural/agricultural areas.

Houston might also be a possibility (at least in the minds of Houstonians).

Missouri's Conference Options

Berry Tramel examines Missouri's conference options. This piece really seems to be a larger commentary on the state of the Big 12, though, in my view.

Historical Overview of Conference Realignment

Today's Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, my hometown newspaper, provides an in-depth historical overview of college football, conference realignment, television, and money. The article, not surprisingly, is Texas Tech-centric, but also quotes sports historians and economists from elsewhere. One thing I had not known about is the cyclical nature historically of teams aggregating into large conferences and then the large conferences splitting back into smaller ones. Quoting from the article:

Superconferences are not a new concept. [Historian J.S.] Watterson said they’ve existed in similar forms before. For instance, the Southern Conference was what he called a “fairly decentralized” league that swelled to 23 teams during the 1920s before splitting into the SEC and ACC some 30 years later.

The article also helps break down the recent mindboggling television contracts into how much exactly each school in a given conference will receive. For example, the Big 12 has a $1.17 billion deal with Fox Sports, but it's over 13 years, making it $90 million per annum. Divided 10 ways ("provided the league replaces SEC-bound A&M"), that's $9 million per school, per year.