The college sports world was turned on its head once again this offseason with the Colorado Buffaloes and other programs announcing their intentions to move conferences.
The big winner of this latest round of realignment is without a doubt the Big 12 as the conference added four teams from the ashes of the Pac-12 in Colorado, Arizona State, Arizona and Utah. The Big 12 has done a masterful job of weathering the loss of Texas and Oklahoma and has come out the other end with a new TV deal and a footprint that spans nearly coast-to-coast.
Colorado’s season opener against TCU on Saturday will mark the last time that the two teams will face each other as nonconference opponents, at least in the foreseeable future.
As kickoff approaches between the Buffs and Horned Frogs nears, I reached out to Anthony North of Frogs O’War and asked for his thoughts on where the Big 12 stands:
When Texas and Oklahoma announced their departure to the SEC, everyone began to write the Big 12 obituary. The league brought in Brett Yormark as Commissioner and a year later the Big 12 is sitting in a position of having power-raided the Pac 12. For TCU, it certainly feels good to be on the right side of conference realignment upheaval, after being left to wander the CFB wilderness when the Southwest Conference merged with the Big 8. I’m excited for the new Big 12, it will be a wide open entertaining product every season with big time rivalries renewed and new ones sure to form. The football and baseball will be competitive at a very high level and the basketball will be the nation’s best. Whatever future form of college football consolidation takes place and however the College Football Playoff will work in the future, the Big 12 will be a part of it, a statement that was far less certain a year ago.
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