With the recent blockbuster news of UCLA and USC leaving the PAC-12 (and making it the PAC-10 once again) for the Big Ten the college football world is left wondering where the next domino of the shakeup of college football conferences will fall. The only hope for the PAC-12 is to respond like the Big 12 did when Texas and Oklahoma left. That hope is to expand and find the best teams they can to fill the gaps. The Big 12 did well to secure BYU (a national school), Houston (the fourth-largest city in the country), UCF (a Florida school in Orlando), and Cincinnati (a built-up program in the backyard of the B1G).
REWINNING THE WEST
While there aren’t as good of options for the PAC-12 as there were for the Big 12 there are still good choices. The first and foremost is the original college football spoiler the Boise State Broncos. Boise State would be natural rivals for Utah and Washington State. The Broncos would be ready to compete right away in the PAC-12.
Choices after Boise State become a little less clear. Necessity would take them to Southern California. There is a team there in a big city that would be a big gain. The San Diego State Aztecs would be must-have for the PAC-12.
After that, it gets even murkier. Fresno State would be another California school in a major metropolitan area to replace another one that they lost. This would say to USC and UCLA that the PAC-12 will fight for the state of California.
The next choices are not obvious and require equal parts boldness and desperation for the PAC-12. 16 seems to be the magic number for conferences right now vying to stay in that Power Five category. That means they would have to do what the others have done and forgo their traditional geographic region. The PAC-12 would have to go east.
GOING EAST
Their first stop would need to be Memphis, Tennessee, and the Memphis Tigers. Memphis is in the heart of SEC country and near the Big 12 footprint as well. They are also a target for the ACC who is trying to keep their best teams from being lured away. Memphis is already competitive in both football and basketball and would be a must-get for the PAC-12
The next place would be Dallas, Texas, and the SMU Mustangs. Having a team in one of the fastest-growing areas in the country would be a huge win. Texas is already a battleground for recruiting. Having three of the Power Five conferences have a team in the state would ensure that no one conference would have the lion’s share of the massive amount of talent there.
The final place has the program with the least prowess. That town is New Orleans. Home of the Tulane Green Wave. Adding a program from New Orleans would make the offer to teams from Memphis and Dallas-Fort Worth that much more attractive. Adding a fourth team in the area like Tulsa over Fresno State to have a pod in the eastern portion of the conference would be up for discussion as well.
So, would adding teams that are strong in football right now like Boise, and teams in large cities like SDSU, Fresno State, Memphis, SMU, and Tulane be enough to keep teams like Oregon and Washington from leaving for the greener pasture of the Big Ten? Or ASU, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado from going to the much more competitive Big 12? Could the PAC-12 and ACC form some sort of Pacific-Atlantic Conference to fight the growing strength of the others? It is like a long shot, but it also is the only shot that the once-proud Conference of Champions has left to avoid being carved up and becoming a footnote to the history books of college athletics. Whatever happens, as the conferences continue to realign, it will be interesting and surprising to see where the wheel finally stops turning for a while.