The impetus since the summer of 2010 has been to expand BCS’s automatic qualifying conferences from the size of 8 to 12 teams to a super conference of 16 teams. The idea is that a 16-team super conference is worth more to a television partner like ESPN, Comcast, or Fox than two separate 8-team conferences. The PAC-12 (formerly PAC-10) got the ball rolling by aggressively courting Texas and Oklahoma, while eventually settling for Colorado and Utah; the Big Ten around the same time added Nebraska. Soon after, the PAC-12 signed a 12-year, $ 3 billion television deal with Fox and ESPN and this seemed to give some credit to the idea of expanding the conference. However, there is a feeling that television offerings were simply undervalued in recent years and that even if the PAC-12 had not been expanded, they would have received a good offer. Utah had previously earned less than $ 2 million per year as part of the Mountain West Conference and Colorado made about $ 9 million per year at the Big XII. Now they were going to make about $ 21 million a year. Had adding these schools earned the PAC-12 Conference a lot more money? Probably not.
Twelve schools is the ideal size for a soccer conference. It allows schools to play with the other 5 teams in their division and with 3-4 crossover teams in the other division. This guarantees that you will perform at all schools in your conference at least every two years. If you go to 16 teams, you will have opponents of 7 divisions and a maximum of 2 crossover games. There will be teams that you will only see once every 4 years. That’s ridiculous. How are the teams in the same conference if you never play them? The WAC in 1996 was the original superconference with Utah, BYU, Colorado State, Air Force, Wyoming, Hawaii, San Diego State, UTEP, UNLV, TCU, SMU, Rice, Tulsa, Fresno State, San Jose State, and New Mexico. It was a failure and resulted in 8 of the older members leaving to form Mountain West. They cited excessive travel costs, a decline in traditional rivalries and history, as well as having 16 teams with which to share the revenue.
PAC-12 is probably the potential superconference that has the most disjointed structure. The PAC-12 looks down at Mountain West schools that are the most geographic in their existing footprint and most likely to target Texas, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas Tech, Missouri, or Kansas from Big XII. This will result in bringing schools that are very geographically and perhaps culturally different to their existing member schools. This will also move Arizona and the state of Arizona into an Eastern Division and separate them from the schools they have played since 1978.
There are currently about 110 FBS Division I schools and some schools in the process of promotion. Potential superconferencing commissioners seem to think that four 16-team superconferences will rise to a new higher-level division. This will leave 50-60 schools behind. Is the television cake going to be bigger by dropping 50 to 60 schools? Are schools lucky enough to be in the SEC, the future PAC-16 or BIG Ten (16) much better than everyone else? Is it fair that West Virginia, Boise State, Kansas State, or Fresno State probably won’t make the cut, but Vanderbilt, Washington State, and Indiana will? Is it really good to smash Mountain West, ACC, and Big East? TCU has cited a 100% increase in the app due to its success and national exposure in soccer. Perhaps Texas and USC should double their student body size along with the team’s 50-60 contraction plan to absorb this demand. College football super conferences are dumb. But they will happen, sooner rather than later.