The irony of the BCS, or Bowl Championship Series, was that it was a system that was created to eliminate confusion with split-championships in college football but resulted in a national fiasco that has been a popular topic of discussion among college football fans.
What is becoming popular now is rapid conference realignment, resulting from fans’ desires for a playoff system and four, 16-team super-conferences. The moves started after the 2009-2010 season, when the University of Colorado and the University of Nebraska both left the Big 12 for the Pac-12 and the Big 10 respectively.
Also, the University of Utah and Brigham Young University left the Mountain West Conference for the Pac-12 and the Independents respectively. Boise State University will leave the Western Athletic Conference to fill a spot in the Mountain West.
The realignment continued before this football season when TCU announced they would also be leaving the Mountain West Conference for the Big East and Texas A&M announced they would be moving east to the Southeastern Conference.
The latest change occurred when the University of Pittsburgh and Syracuse University declared they would be leaving the Big East for the Atlantic Coast Conference.
People are now asking what this means for the other 64 BCS schools and the other 111 schools that compete in Division I Football.
The two least populous conferences, the Big East and the Big 12, are now looking to expand. The Big East presidents met in Washington D.C. this weekend and declared they had eight schools in mind for their expansion, Memphis, UCF, East Carolina, Temple, Navy, Army, and Air Force. The eighth is Villanova, which is a member of the Big East in all sports except football. They play in the FCS for football. The addition of these teams would give the Big East 14 teams.
The expansion is now imminent as TCU announced Monday that they would be reversing their decision to move to the Big East, pay the $5 million dollar fee to the Big East, and join the Big 12.
TCU was looked over in the mid-90’s when the Southwest Conference dispersed and the Big 12 added four schools from the conference, but now they were a target of the declining conference.
The move will provide them with more local matchups unlike in the Big East where their closest opponent would’ve been Louisville, which is about 750 miles away from Fort Worth.
With TCU’s rejection of the Big East, it will put the conference at only six schools at the end of the year. To be a BCS Conference, they will have to add at least two schools. Their expansion should be in the news soon since the conference was authorized to add more teams yesterday.
The Big 12 will have 10 schools at the end of this year with the departure of Texas A&M and the arrival of TCU. The University of Missouri is expected to make a decision on their status in the conference by today.
The school was waiting on TCU’s decision. The Big 12 will most likely look to add two more schools.The schools that remain on their radar are BYU and Louisville or West Virginia if the Big East collapses. Some Conference USA schools, like Houston and SMU as well as Boise State, are some targets for the conference as well.
