I was listening to a podcast talking about conference realignment. It sounds like the PAC-12 is basically done. Washington and Oregon appear to be waiting on Arizona, ASU, Utah, and Colorado to jump to the Big 12, and those two will jump to the Big 10.
Oregon State, WSU, Stanford and Cal are basically left in the cold to maybe join up with the MWC.
The ACC 7 or 8 that are looking to break their grant of rights seems to be coming for sure. Won’t be shocked if they establish a temporary ACC to allow them to all jump ship at any point.
With all that in mind, Neal is right that it feels like a Big 2 (SEC and Big 10) and a second tier Big 12, then a bunch of mediocre leagues.
I bring up the playoff though, because one thing that still sticks out to me is that the language on the playoff qualification is Top 6 ranked conference champions and Top 6 at large. No conference has an automatic bid. I think that was by design, because the automatic bid would’ve propped up the ACC and PAC-12. Without that language, the ACC and PAC-12 can dissolve.
What’s interesting though will be to see which other 3 leagues typically end up getting the qualifiers for their champions. No clue what conference realignment will look like at that level, but I could see it being huge for a league like the Sun Belt, given that there will be 3 automatic bids up for lesser leagues.
Oregon State, WSU, Stanford and Cal are basically left in the cold to maybe join up with the MWC.
The ACC 7 or 8 that are looking to break their grant of rights seems to be coming for sure. Won’t be shocked if they establish a temporary ACC to allow them to all jump ship at any point.
With all that in mind, Neal is right that it feels like a Big 2 (SEC and Big 10) and a second tier Big 12, then a bunch of mediocre leagues.
I bring up the playoff though, because one thing that still sticks out to me is that the language on the playoff qualification is Top 6 ranked conference champions and Top 6 at large. No conference has an automatic bid. I think that was by design, because the automatic bid would’ve propped up the ACC and PAC-12. Without that language, the ACC and PAC-12 can dissolve.
What’s interesting though will be to see which other 3 leagues typically end up getting the qualifiers for their champions. No clue what conference realignment will look like at that level, but I could see it being huge for a league like the Sun Belt, given that there will be 3 automatic bids up for lesser leagues.
