What If It Had Been the Pac-16?

This is the first season since the massive conference realignment that changed the landscape of college sports.  Instead of a Power 5, it's now a Power 4, with the Big Ten and ACC both extending coast-to-coast.  The Pac-12, of course, was the big casualty, as the conference saw its members leave one by one until just Oregon State and Washington State were left.

What happens with the Pac-2 moving forward is anyone's guess.  They have two years to figure it out, and have set up scheduling arrangements with the Mountain West for football and the West Coast Conference for everything else.  So, Oregon State and Washington State haven't been left out in the cold completely, even though they've definitely drawn the short straw.  They even negotiated a TV contract with The CW to air their football games.  In a few months, two schools by themselves were able to do something the commissioner couldn't do for the entire conference after more than a year?  Talk about terrible leadership!

We all know what led to the Pac-12's sad demise, which was entirely avoidable (or maybe not).  It's also crazy to think about how different things could've been.  Instead of being the conference that was absorbed by the others, it could've been the first of the superconferences, long before it was even a thought.  If they'd been able to make the move 15 years ago, we definitely wouldn't be talking about the Pac-12 in the past tense.
  
In 2010, the then-Pac-10 was exploring a major expansion that would've seen six teams--Texas, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas A&M, Texas Tech and TCU--join the league.  All but TCU were in the Big 12 at the time (and TCU would eventually join the Big 12 as Texas A&M's replacement when they left for the SEC).  Not only were they in the Big 12, they were the big fish of the Big 12.  It not only would've destroyed the Big 12, it almost certainly would've guaranteed the long-term viability of the Pac-16.

That didn't happen, of course.  Texas and Oklahoma decided to stay in the Big 12, which stayed mainly intact.  The Pac-10 made a more modest expansion of two schools, snagging one Big 12 member (Colorado), along with Utah.  That would be the Pac-12's alignment until this season, when 10 of the 12 schools left for other conferences (including four that went to the Big 12).  Would a Pac-16 have been similarly gutted, though?  Probably not.

Let's start by going back to 2010.  The Pac-10 is successful at adding those six Big 12 schools, leaving just Kansas, Kansas State, Iowa State, Baylor, Colorado, Nebraska and Missouri in the Big 12.  During that round of realignment, Nebraska ended up going to the Big Ten, so let's assume that still happens and they're at six.  They obviously need to expand.  West Virginia was the first new members to join the Big 12 along with TCU, so we'll give them the nod.  And Utah's not joining the Pac-12 now, so they join the Big 12 instead.  And, since the Big 12 only had 10 for a number of years, we're keeping it there and having BYU and Houston join the conference years earlier than they actually did.

Here's where it starts to get interesting, though.  Texas A&M has just made the move to a newly-expanded Pac-16.  Do they still go to the SEC?  Does the SEC even go from 12 to 14 at the time?  If the answer is "Yes," you've either got Texas A&M leaving the Pac-16 after just a year or the SEC grabs someone else along with Missouri.  This isn't even necessarily another Big 12 team since the remaining options, frankly, wouldn't be that attractive.  Maybe they grab Louisville, who's still in the Big East at the time?

Regardless of what's going on in the other conferences, let's bring this back to the Pac-16.  This is a league that consists of Arizona, Arizona State, Cal, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Oregon, Oregon State, Stanford, TCU, Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, UCLA, USC, Washington and Washington State.  That's a pretty strong conference!  The ACC and Big 12 would still hold their own in basketball, but in football (which, as we've all seen is the whole point for all of this), it's clear who the top three conferences would be.

More importantly, a Pac-16 that includes Texas, Texas A&M and Oklahoma is a far more attractive league from a media rights perspective.  Media rights is where the Pac-12 really dropped the ball and precipitated its demise, but you'd have to think the Pac-12 Network (which was really ahead of its time if you think about it) would've had a broader reach and wider availability.  And, as a result, even with the money being split 16 ways, it would've generated significantly more revenue for each school.  If they're getting more revenue, would there still have been that desire to leave?

Of course, the media rights landscape is much different now than it was in 2010.  The reason for all of this is because the schools that switched leagues thought it was better for them financially.  So, I'm not saying that the Pac-16 would've made it through the most recent round of realignment unscathed.  Rather, I'm suggesting that the conference would've been in a strong enough position to survive.  It would lose members, but not enough to be completely decimated.

For argument's sake, let's assume that the Texas and Oklahoma to the SEC thing still happens.  So does the UCLA and USC to the Big Ten thing.  (It was, of course, the Pac-12's terrible reaction to those departures that got the ball rolling on its demise.)  The rest of it all happened pretty quickly, though.  If the Pac-16 actually had competent leadership and a worthwhile media rights deal, those schools might not be so eager to get out.  Especially since, let's not forget, the Big 12 is the weaker conference in this scenario.

I'll even extend this hypothetical.  Oregon and Washington to the Big Ten still happens, as well.  And, for argument's sake, Texas A&M has already left the Pac-16 for the SEC and had been replaced by Colorado (which, obviously, was the only Big 12 team that actually went to the Pac-12 back in 2010).  That leaves us with Arizona, Arizona State, Cal, Colorado, Oklahoma State, Oregon State, Stanford, TCU, Texas Tech and Washington State in the Pac-#.  The Big 12's alignment, meanwhile, consists of just Baylor, Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State, as well as any new members that potentially joined in the interim.

It wouldn't be very hard for the Pac-# to scoop up the remnants of the Big 12, especially with powerhouse basketball programs in Kansas and Baylor.  It would also be very hard to pass up BYU, Utah and Houston.  Or, since I've got the Pac-# losing six, do you take just the four core Big 12 teams and the two schools in Utah, leaving Houston and West Virginia as the new Oregon State and Washington State?  (Which opens them up to take Cal & Stanford's spots in the ACC, putting West Virginia and Pitt in the same conference again.)  Let's not forget about San Diego State, either.  You know, the school the Pac-12 should've added immediately after UCLA and USC announced they were leaving.

All of this, obviously, plays with a lot of what-ifs.  Who knows what would've happened and how the conferences would've responded had any of these scenarios actually played out?  I feel pretty confident in saying the Pac-# would've survived this round of realignment, though.  It's crazy how something that didn't happen 15 years ago continues to have such an impact today!