Ozzie Osborne’s crazy train has another passenger: the NCAA.
While Texas A&M and Oklahoma are slamming down the accelerator, Baylor is dangling off the end of the caboose.
The news that the SEC has unanimously voted to adopt the Aggies into its happy family rocked the college football world. With this news, the Big-12 has become a nine-team conference that has lost an important piece of the puzzle. It won’t be long until Oklahoma and Oklahoma State realize that the difference in cash flow between the Big-12 and the Pac-12. In fact, they probably already have.
George Schroeder, who works around the University of Oklahoma, had a source close to the action that said Wednesday, “We’re not quite there yet….But the trend is moving there.”
Oklahoma State released a statement Saturday that essentially said that the two schools were in this thing together.
But how does this affect the rest of the Big-12?
If OU and OSU decide to leave the Big 12, the league is over. As good as Texas is, it cannot hold together a seven-team conference. The Longhorns will have a big decision to make.
It could go independent and grow its recently developed network, or it could join the Pac-12.
The latter is much more profitable for a multitude of reasons, even if it means adjusting the new Longhorn network. If UT joins then its sucker fish Texas Tech will join as well.
For ASU this would include both good and bad news. For UA, it would be almost all bad.
Both Arizona teams would likely get more games on national television, which means more money.
Of course it also means that USC and UCLA would be out of the newly formed Pac-16, which means the Los Angeles teams would be mostly out of play.
The main problem would be level of talent added to the division. Trading USC and UCLA for the four from the Big 12 would mean the Arizona schools could go from favorites to win the South in 2011 to middle of the division in 2012.
The best thing about the deal for both teams would be the possible addition of another automatic BCS bid.
The reason it would be so much more detrimental for UA would be the recruiting.
Mike Stoops has had a consistent pipeline of players come out of Texas during his tenure at Arizona. He had 7 of his 25 players come from the Lone Star State in 2009 and a total of 16 players on the 2011 roster.
Meanwhile, Dennis Erickson, who has hardly touched anything east of Colorado, has been growing a great pipeline on the other side of the Colorado River.
10 of his 22 commits in 2009, including star player Vontaze Burfict, were from California. That number rose to 19 recruits in 2010 and a total of 54 players are on this year’s team.
With the Big 12 schools jumping ship and the Big East (TCU joins in 2012) and SEC sticking their foot in the door, the recruiting opportunities in Texas could diminish. Also, Baylor will have to go somewhere, meaning there will be five conferences with teams based in Texas compared to three right now.
Since ASU would be the closest school to Los Angeles in the East Division, continuing to recruit in Southern California shouldn’t be too hard. It might even get easier as USC and UCLA don’t look to be powerhouses in what would be the new East division.
There is no telling what the future holds for college football in Arizona, but for now they should enjoy their reign as favorites in the South Division.
They might not have it much longer.
Reach the reporter at jjmckelv@asu.edu.
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