Expansion would also give the Big 12 more stability in an evolving media landscape.
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The Big 12 presidents have directed Commissioner Bob Bowlsby to evaluate schools that are interested in joining the conference, stopping just short of announcing it was committed to expansion.
“A number of universities have contacted the Big 12 to express interest in our conference”, said Boren, Oklahoma University president and chariman of the conference board of directors following a meeting in Dallas.
“At the end of that discussion, the decision of the board was to have the commissioner re-contact those schools who have contacted the conference and evaluate their interests, and he will be reporting back to us”.
West Virginia University head coach Dana Holgorsen supports the idea of conference expansion.
Bowlsby and the conference leaders decided not to react to one year’s results and instead studied expansion along with the possibility of bringing back its championship game and trying to start a conference television network. “We have been contacted by a number of institutions, and my guess is that after this news breaks we’ll be contacted by them again”. The most mentioned candidates include the Cincinnati Bearcats, Connecticut Huskies, Memphis Tigers, Houston Cougars, BYU Cougars, Colorado State Rams, and the UCF Knights.
Bowlsby said he could not provide a timeline.
“We intend to be very active pretty soon”, Bowlsby said.
“Expansion has been intertwined with starting a network but there are still many other advantages”, Boren said. And that we want to move forward and have a full evaluation of exactly the level of their interest, what kind of proposals they might make to us in terms of terms and conditions for joining the conference.
Bowlsby: “I don’t know I’m prepared to put a time frame on it right now. I would be presumptuous and not fully honest if I told you I have a fully fleshed-out plan at this point”.
Baylor officials met with Big 12 members for two hours today. A interesting bit is that it was a unanimous vote, meaning previously seen as against expansion Texas, voted for the motion.
“Something has been agreed to with the ACC, we don’t know all the details at this point, but it indicates that we live in a very fast-changing world, (the) situation is changing quickly”, Boren said.
That’s why it was cringe-worthy when Grobe said things Tuesday such as, “We don’t have a culture of bad behavior at Baylor University” and “the problems we have dealt with at Baylor are probably problems at every university in the country”.
This is how the Pepper Hamilton report on the sexual assault and Title IX problems at Baylor described how the school, athletic department and coaches failed to take appropriate action to respond to reports of sexual assault and dating violence committed by football players.
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In what nearly appears to be a complete reversal from its previous stance, the Big 12 conference announced after its Board of Directors meeting Tuesday afternoon that it is actively exploring expansion.
