Nelly to Perform 'Super Bowl-Like' Halftime Show at 2023 Big 12 Title Game

Having survived the newest round of realignment, the Big 12 is ready to celebrate.

The conference has enlisted the services of Nelly for the halftime show during its championship game on Dec. 2 at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas. Action Network's Brett McMurphy reported it will be a "Super Bowl-like" spectacle.

"We are thrilled to announce Nelly will be joining our school's marching bands to perform at the first-ever Big 12 Football Championship halftime show," Commissioner Brett Yormark said Wednesday. "The Big 12 is committed to living at the intersection of sports and culture and introducing Championship enhancements that are best in class."

With this kind of hype, we better be getting a repeat of Creed's legendary performance at halftime on Thanksgiving Day in 2001 at the Dallas Cowboys' old home in Irving.

McMurphy's report is bound to draw some mockery because of the gulf in status between the Big 12 title game and the Super Bowl. But you can't blame the conference for trying to widen its audience by whatever means necessary.

Yormark did well to pivot after the Big 12 lost Oklahoma and Texas, its two biggest football brands, to the SEC. That could've been a death blow not unlike what UCLA and USC's defections for the Big Ten ultimately meant for the Pac-12.

Instead, the Big 12 is thriving in relative terms.

Staging a big-budget halftime show is somewhat superficial and will unlikely move the needle much. What it represents in terms of Yormark's attempt to burnish the Big 12's image might have bigger ramifications.