Pac-10 Expansion Bombshell: Texas Leads Four Big 12 Schools To Jump West

Colorado has left the Big 12 for the PAC-10 resulting in the first conference expansion in the PAC-10 since 1978.

It looks as if they aren't the only ones.

Reports are breaking that four more schools are strongly considering the idea of joining the PAC-10 eventually resulting in two divisions an East and West.

The big names that are surrounded around the controversy here is Texas.  One of the biggest football programs in the last ten years, the Longhorns decision to move westward will create a 16 team mega-conference.

Joining Texas are rumored to be Texas Tech, Oklahoma, and Oklahoma State—all teams that have had success in recent years.  This move is certainly going to shake up the college athletics landscape.

Keep your eye on Texas A&M as there are reports out that they are torn between joining the PAC-10 with this group or flying solo and joining the Southeastern Conference.

Just today, Boise State has accepted an invitation to become a member of the Mountain West Conference come July 2011.  This only increases their football viability and could potentially make them a BCS conference automatic bid.

What is more central to the PAC-10 expanding at the dismay of the Big 12 is where does this shift the spectrum out East.

Nebraska has already accepted a bid to the Big Ten.  You have to imagine that a sixth team is going to join the PAC-10 with the most likely school being Texas A&M.

Missouri is another possibility in joining the Big Ten.  The problem with the PAC-10 expanding to sixteen teams is the fact that other major power conferences might see that as a number that they have to match.

Look out for school such as Syracuse, Pittsburgh, and Rutgers to become heavily recruited by the Big Ten in that instance.

The big elephant in the room as far as the Big Ten is concerned is Notre Dame.  If all these different super conferences start to form, Notre Dame is going to have to accept an offer to join the Big Ten.

Notre Dame is not what is was back in the late 80's and early 90's.  I don't care what anybody says.  They can't contend for a national championship and who cares what kind of special television contract with NBC.  There comes a time and place where the independence has to be lost ND and that time is approaching.

That would put the Big East in a tough position as it could possibility have to start thinking about leaving the conference or pulling other teams in.  There's a good chance that the ACC and SEC could come calling to different universities up and down the Eastern seaboard.

What happens now if you're Kansas, Kansas State, Iowa, Iowa State, and Baylor. Basically you're left with nowhere to go and I don't see how this can possibly happen because of what these schools bring to the table.

Most importantly, Kansas is a proven national championship basketball school and there has to be a conference with credibility for them to join.  

The biggest problem here is all the money is surrounded around football right now.  The BCS conferences have exclusive television deals, marketing campaigns, and ads that target specific audiences.

This is only the beginning of what is going to be an absolute shakeup in the land of college athletics.  Conferences are going to be destroyed at the hands of others.  It will end up creating new rivalries and killing old ones.

In the hands of the few and powerful who reside on the Board of Trustees.  These decisions should be made in the best interest of the schools, but it rarely works out that way.  The time has come for conferences to realign with those that they believe will make them a better school academically and athletically.

This is only the beginning of what is to come.

The time is now for college expansion and that is only in the early stages of what could be a crash-course collision in the field of NCAA Athletics.