Now that the calendar has flipped to July, the Big 12 Conference and American Athletic Conferences have officially welcomed new member institutions.
The Big 12 welcomed four new full-time members in BYU, Central Florida, Cincinnati, and Houston. They will join Baylor, Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State, Oklahoma State, TCU, Texas Tech, and West Virginia as members of the conference.ย Oklahoma and Texas are also members of the conference for the 2023-2024 academic year but will depart on July 1, 2024, for the SEC.
BYU comes to the Big 12 after being independent from 2011 through this past academic year. The university was most recently a member of the Mountain West Conference from 1999 through 2021.
Central Florida, Cincinnati, and Houston all come to the conference after being part of the American Athletic Conference since its beginning in 2013.
On Friday, AAC commissioner Mike Aresco released a statement on the departure of Central Florida, Cincinnati, and Houston.
“As we witness renewal as well as change in welcoming six new schools on July 1, I want to take a moment to thank and congratulate our three departing schools, Cincinnati, Houston, and UCF for all the contributions they have made to our conference and to wish them much success in their new conference.”
Aresco also commented on the achievements that the three schools had while as part of The American will “always be a lasting legacy for The American” and that the conference “will be rooting for them in the new home,” with the exception of whenever they may see them again in a competition setting.
While the AAC says goodbye to those institutions, they also welcome six new universities into the fold in; Charlotte, FAU, North Texas, Rice, UAB, and UTSA. They will join the conference’s nine remaining members in East Carolina, Memphis, Navy, South Florida, SMU, Temple, Tulane, Tulsa, and Wichita State.
๐ ๐ป๐ฒ๐ ๐ฑ๐ฎ๐. ๐ ๐ป๐ฒ๐ ๐ฒ๐ฟ๐ฎ.#๐๐บ๐ฒ๐ฟ๐ถ๐ฐ๐ฎ๐ป๐ฃ๐ผ๐๐ฒ๐ฟ ๐ #๐ฃ๐ผ๐๐ฒ๐ฟ๐๐ผ๐ฟ๐๐ฎ๐ฟ๐ฑ pic.twitter.com/sxHxSnPWcg
— The American (@American_Conf) July 1, 2023
Notably Navy is only part of the conference for football only while Wichita State only competes in the AAC for basketball and Olympic sports.
Beyond the Big 12 and AAC welcoming their new institutions, there is an update on the future of San Diego State, and more from the College Wires discussed in today’s roundup.