A Hectic Offseason

By Ashley Y.
SouthernPigskin.com

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It is now time to come up for a breath of fresh air and look forward to those crisp Saturdays in the fall.

For anyone else who has been furiously busy as the end of the school calendar year came, you may find yourself looking around and wondering what is happening to college football. Welcome to summer; it is now time to come up for a breath of fresh air and look forward to those crisp Saturdays in the fall. It seems like our NCAA Saturdays and schedules are beginning to look more and more like the NFL with each passing day.

First, there is talk of 16-team conferences all the way around. This would be simple for the SEC, which has multiple schools licking their chops at the opportunity. The SEC has already taken new teams for the 2012 season, but, should they need additional teams, there would be no shortage of teams interested. The ACC seems to be getting more fragile everyday. Teams like Florida State, Clemson, Virginia Tech, and North Carolina State may be interested in the SEC.

A little less anticipatory are the ACC, Big-12, and Pac-12. ACC commissioner John Swofford has stated that he does not believe any of his schools are talking to other conferences or thinking about leaving the ACC. This may be a stretch. None the less, should the ACC need teams to create a 16-team conference, they definitely don’t want to be losing any teams.

The Pac-12 has the most geographical trouble. It seems they may have taken all the schools west of the Mississippi that they are interested in, so where do they turn now?

Saving the toughest for last is the Big-12. They are now only ten teams strong, and you can only convince so many “little brothers” to compete with Texas day in and day out. Texas A&M bolted as soon as they could to create their own identity separate from the Longhorns. It won’t be easy to get other marquee names into the conference.

This makes an interesting point for Oklahoma and even Oklahoma State. Do you stay in the “Texas Conference” or leave? There is a price tag for everything. There has also been flirtation with Florida State going to the Big-12. This may be the one major team that could breathe some life into the Big-12.

It is not necessary that each “Super Conference” expand to 16 teams, but it would make the possible transition into playoff format so simple.

Additionally, where does Miami go? And will this be the change that brings Notre Dame into a major college football conference?

Other newsworthy information is the Big-12/SEC showdown, which will start on New Years Day in 2014. The commissioners would like the game to gain the notoriety of the Rose Bowl and be a tradition for years to come.

This game would allow the best team in the Big-12 to play the best team in the SEC, thus determining which is the “better” conference. However, if either team is slated to play in the BCS Championship or what may become a four-team playoff, those teams would not compete in the showdown. The best teams, who are not in bigger and better games, will play on New Years Day. This would, essentially, create a new bowl game but not necessarily change the outcome of anything.

We can’t forget to mention (SEC fans!) that our two brand new teams will start competing in less than 100 days. We have big decisions to make. Are we going to travel to our new destinations? What do we think our rookies’ records will be? What are their tailgating traditions like?

Here’s to a slightly less hectic summer and SEC Media Days arrival. There are a lot of questions to be answered. Rest easy because we are now less than 100 days awat frmo the start of football season.