If the Big12 expands, they're not taking the puny programs. If they're going to cut their pie into more slices, they're going to make sure the new programs add to the size of the pie--namely, USC, UCLA (basketball), Washington, and Oregon. What would be left of the PAC12 would be so insignificant (Cal, Stanford, WASU, Oregon St, the Arizona's, etc.), they'd just try getting into the MW.
Which, again, just shows how ridiculous this whole thing is because the schools who are making the PAC12 seem unstable (due to state governments), would actually benefit from the PAC12 being plucked.
But this isn't a state government issue. This is a lack of institutional control by the NCAA as a whole. This would be like California not allowing the NFL to play home games and the Dallas Cowboys raiding the rosters and coaching staffs of the last two NFC Champions. That's laughable because there are rules in place against it. Not so in college.
Why would Washington, Oregon, and USC want to leave the Pac-12 to be governed by a bunch of tobacco chewing ranchers from Oklahoma and Texas?
They bring lots of money, at least those schools do, but they would have no say or power in a conference that already fell apart because its top school, Texas, was being an insufferable POS in terms of TV and revenue sharing.
Its 2nd in command, Oklahoma, "was within hours" of leaving until things settled down.
Geographically, thats not a particularly favorable element of travel for the newer members.
Also, while the Pac-12 is considerably weak in football, they seem to pride themselves in Olympic sports. They dominate that category. Its also the conference with the most team titles and that seems to mean something...to me, it means while football is very important to that conference, it isn't everything. The same isn't easily said for the Big 12.
Texas and OU should go the Notre Dame route, where they are Independent by title but play 5 games with an associated conference to allow them a CFP bid, unless it grants exceptions for true independents (and it may, since Texas and OU have considerable influence, but not yet). In that case, stay with the Big 12...so you keep your rivalries...Texas Tech, Baylor, OSU, and of course the Red River Shootout. You can then add Texas A&M or Notre Dame or Nebraska, etc.
Those two could make the pie huge with each game being a solid marquee opponent and sharing it with someone who only adds to it.
I agree with the rest that the NCAA is laughably terrible.
