"Texas and the rest of the Big XII stick together" by Ronald Carthen

I'm so glad that Texas, Oklahoma, Texas A&M, and Oklahoma St. will stick together and stay with the Big XII. Texas played a huge role on the decision of heading to the Pac-10, but as soon as the Longhorns said no to Pac-10 commissioner Larry Scott's invitation, Oklahoma an Oklahoma St. followed while Texas A&M said no to the the Pac-10 and the SEC. Everybody knows all four schools stayed in their conference because of money, it's the only thing that matters in college athletics these days.

Texas had a meeting on Monday with the other nine remaining schools to in the conference to talk about a Fox Sports TV deal that Big XII commissioner Dan Beebe put together. Texas, Oklahoma, Texas A&M, and Oklahoma St. would earn at least $20 million a year, while the the other schools could earn between $14 million and $17 million. Last year, the schools divided between $7 million and $10 million each depending on how many appearances they made on regional and national TV.

Now the Pac-10 and Scott will be looking for at least one more member to get 12 teams by 2012 when Colorado joins the conference. Utah from the Mountain West conference is a likely candidate to join the this conference.

Even though Nebraska, who's heading to the Big Ten in 2011, and Colorado are leaving the Big XII, I'm glad the rest of the conference will make a ten-team conference work in 2012. For a second there, I really thought I was going to see the Pac-10 become second best conference, behind the SEC, in the country. This was going to ruin both basketball and especially football. Can you imagine Texas and Oklahoma not in your conference anymore. How about the Kansas Jayhawks basketball program, how will they get the best players in the nation with Kansas State, Baylor, Missouri, and Iowa State in their conference? Now the Pac-10 is back to the same USC or the field football conference and one of the worst basketball conference in the country.

The Big XII will not have a football conference championship game by 2012, but the Red River shootout between Texas and Oklahoma will be a much bigger football game now. This game will determine who will win the conference championship year after year.

Even though Nebraska heading to the Big Ten hurts a little bit in football, this conference will survive as long as you have the Longhorns and the Sooners. I didn't mention Colorado because nobody cares about this school in football and especially basketball. They will not hurt anybody's pockets anytime soon.

I think it's great to see the Big XII survive, but man they were this close from being as bad as Conference USA, the Sun Belt, or the WAC.