Big 12 Board Chairwoman and Baylor President Linda Livingstone has sent a letter to Power 4 conference leaders inviting them to a summit in early December to discuss the future of college athletics and more specifically, new football models.
Livingstone is hoping the presidents and chancellors of the ACC, Big Ten and SEC will join the Big 12 at the “Presidents and Chancellors Summit on the Future of College Athletics” on Dec. 2-3 in Dallas, according to The Athletic.
Livingstone references two “so-called college football super league models” that have been circulating in recent weeks, and wants “an opportunity to hear from the architects of these models or to discuss their implications together as university leaders.”
“The Big 12 Conference Board of Directors agrees there is an urgent need for the presidents and chancellors from the ACC, Big 12, Big Ten and SEC to gather in person to discuss these and other topics impacting college athletics and each of our universities,” Livingstone wrote.
ESPN‘s Pete Thamel reports that there is no expectation that any SEC or Big Ten Presidents will attend. Last month, we reported that the SEC and Big Ten were discussing a potential partnership to align their college football schedules to give them an upper hand on the ACC and Big 12.
The idea to hear directly from the creators of the two super league models arose during a Big 12 Board meeting in October and evolved into Livingstone hoping to have all the Power conferences leaders come together.
The letter was born from a discussion at a Big 12 board meeting in October, where Livingstone expressed a desire for the Big 12 board to learn more about the options that have surfaced in the market. Some board members were surprised, per sources, this turned into a potential…
— Pete Thamel (@PeteThamel) November 6, 2024
Livingstone is also currently serving as the chair of the NCAA’s Board of Governors.
The super league models are being pitched as a way of preserving certain aspects of college football (and college sports in general) while bringing in a more professionalized system after the landmark settlement in the House v. NCAA case earlier this year.
The two super league models that have been circulating in recent weeks are the “College Student Football League” and “Project Rudy.”
The College Student Football League is a reorganization of the 136-team and 10-conference Football Bowl Subdivision into a single league, while Project Rudy was created by a group of former Disney Executives and would inject billions of dollars into the Power 4 schools to create a business that would largely maintain the existing structure of college football.
The Big Ten and SEC reportedly have shown no interest in either, while ACC Athletic Directors saw a presentation on Project Rudy on Nov. 6.
$$$ reigns supreme in America. It’s that simple.
The idea that there is a power 4 or there will be a “super league” that contains 60+ teams is a pipe dream.
The TV contracts tells us there are 2 leagues that hold the best hand at the moment, and those leagues are the SEC and B1G. Right now they are continuing to position themselves to remain in control. They aren’t going to want to divide the pie bigger than they have to, which means a lot of teams will be left out.
The college sports model is fundamentally shifting on many different fronts and the dust still hasn’t settled.
I kind of wish they would just form a Big 4 alignment to establish a top tier of schools. This would then setup the scenario where lower level schools could advocate to be included in one of the big 4 conferences, sort of like a capitalistic style relegation setup, not purely based on performance but value added to a league.
Regardless, once these big 4 conferences establish themselves as a collective, at some point in the future (near/far) they will think about expansion, because money of course, and other schools will be battling for inclusion
Let the games begin!
If the SEC and Big 10 are coluding to dominate, isn’t that itself an attempt to monopolize and an antitrust violation? Perhaps the ACC, theBig12, or one or more of the other conferences needs to bring a civil antitrust suit and seek billions in damages (perhaps trebled?)
REM sang it best “it’s the end of the world as we know and I feel fine.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0GFRcFm-aY
Baylor and the Big 12 “We don’t need Texas or OU. Good riddance.”
Also Baylor/Big 12 4 months later “So can we have a play date?”
Typical Longhorn response.
Texas and the Big 12, “We don’t need A&M, Missouri, Colorado or Nebraska”.
Also Texas 12 years later…”Please, please, please can we come too!!”
You hate us cause you ain’t us
As what I wrote is not untrue. Texas made an effort to keep the Big12 together by agreeing to an equal revenue split even though they carried the water for the conference from a TV standpoint
They helped prop up half the leagues AD’s and in return received vile attitudes like yours. So forgive us if it’s ZFG for remnants
One of the more tired urban myths is that Texas chased out those teams with the LHN (especially ag) when in fact the floated the idea of a big 12 network and were rebuffed, then a lone star network with atm and were told “no thanks”. Texas was forward thinking… Read more »
…links? Because a lot of this is just not true lol.
“You hate us cause you ain’t us”
No, that “ain’t” the reason, but you did show the rest of us why.