Conference Expansion: The Death of College Football as We Know It

Is this the end of college football as we know it?  Sure looks that way.

 Conferences are in shambles all over the nation, scrambling to add teams before they get scooped up by another conference.  It’s bedlam, to say the least.  While many people think the move to bigger, more powerful conferences is a good thing, I simply don’t like it.

College football is an experience much bigger than the game itself.  It’s about marching bands, pageantry and rivals.  There’s a reason one of the biggest recruiting websites calls itself “Rivals.”

While the shuffling of teams from conference to conference certainly means more money in the school’s pocket, it also means that we’re bound to lose part of college football’s history.

My favorite thing about the Pac 10 football conference was that each team had to play every team in the conference, resulting in a true conference champion.  You didn’t get a break in the schedule if you missed a tough opponent.

Kiss that goodbye.

It certainly seems like we’re headed for a 16-team super conference out west/southwest.  As I stated when the Big Ten was talking about expanding by up to five additional teams (they still might), what good is being in the same conference with a team if you only play them every three or four years?  Sure, some traditional rivalries will be preserved, but many more will dissolve to almost nothing.  Cal and Stanford will probably still play every year, but the day may be approaching when USC and Oregon won’t.

Oregon State’s been a bit of a thorn in the Trojans’ side.  I’d hate for the Beavers to miss out on the chance to derail another USC championship run.  Although, the NCAA kind of took care of that for everybody today (rightfully so, in my book).

It’s widely assumed that Nebraska will join the Big Ten on Friday.  It sure looks like the Big 12 is going to dissolve.  That’s a shame.  It was a good conference with some good rivalries.

The fact that Kansas is being mostly ignored in the fracas tells you how much football is driving the conference shuffling.  Kansas isn’t a great football school, but they’ve had some good years in the past decade.  Still, they are one of the five best basketball programs in the country and the conferences aren’t beating down their doors.

There’s a lot of maneuvering to be done before this all shakes out, but one thing is certain:  the college football landscape is changing.

Sometimes change is good, I don’t think this is one of those instances.