The UCLA Bruins and USC Trojans are in talks to realign conferences from the PAC-12 Conference to the Big Ten Conference as early as 2024, according to Jon Wilner on Twitter Thursday. Ross Dellenger of Sports Illustrated confirmed on Twitter that there are ongoing negotiations. Wilner said nothing has been finalized by the “highest levels of power.”
Last summer, Texas and Oklahoma shocked the college football landscape by announcing to leave the Big 12 for the SEC. One year later, two more athletic goliaths from a weaker Power 5 conference are interested in moving to one of the top two college football conferences (Big Ten and SEC).
This would put a rift in the regular PAC-12 versus Big Ten bowl games such as the Rose Bowl, and more teams like Oregon could jump ship and follow soon. It also brings up the question of national college conferences, with California schools in the same conference as eastern schools like Maryland, Penn State and Rutgers. Unlike Texas’s and Oklahoma’s moves to the SEC, these two teams are in different time zones and vastly different climates than the other Big Ten schools.
In 10 years, will collegiate sports consist of just the Big Ten and SEC? One thing is for sure, if this move happens, everything will change.