Pac-12 open to possible expansion

Interview with new Pac-12 commissioner George Kliavkoff in the Las Vegas Review-Journal yesterday, 2021-08-19…

Review-Journal:
Is there anything you can tell us about realignment and its impact on the Pac-12?

Kliavkoff:
I think we’re really, really happy with the 12 that we have in the league. The opportunity to revisit that following Texas and Oklahoma has certainly presented itself. I am not actively poaching any school or convincing anyone to leave their existing conference, but I wouldn’t be doing my job if I wasn’t listening to schools that wanted to go in the Pac-12, and we’ve had a lot of them reach out. Probably all of the ones you would expect and several you’d be surprised by…
We have taken initial meetings with everyone that has expressed an interest. We have a working group … who are together deciding on what to recommend … At the end of the day, they’ll make the decision about whether or not to offer admission to the Pac-12 to any other schools.

Review-Journal:
Do you have a deadline?

Kliavkoff:
There’s no hard deadline related to any of this, but I would say I don’t think it’s good for college athletics given the vibration that’s going on as a result of the Texas and Oklahoma news. The quicker we can dampen that vibration, the better. We will have a decision on whether we intend to expand or not in the next couple of weeks.

Review-Journal:
Where do you see college athletics in five years?

Kliavkoff:
I think five years from now it’s likely to look a lot like it looks today, with some exceptions at the margins. I think all of the talk about super conferences and the reclassification of some of the existing conferences is not necessarily going to happen.

Review-Journal:
That could surprise some people.

Kliavkoff:
If you ask me about 10 or 20 years from now, it may be different, but it seems like a lot of what drives this are the media-rights deals. In the next three to four years, three of the Power Five conferences are going to renegotiate those deals, but I think the membership of those conferences are going to look a lot like they do today.
Las Vegas ReviewJournal.com: Pac-12 open to possible expansion, new commissioner says

HawkErrant wrote: Interview with new Pac-12 commissioner George Kliavkoff in the Las Vegas Review-Journal yesterday, 2021-08-19…

Kliavkoff:
If you ask me about 10 or 20 years from now, it may be different, but it seems like a lot of what drives this are the media-rights deals. In the next three to four years, three of the Power Five conferences are going to renegotiate those deals, but I think the membership of those conferences are going to look a lot like they do today.
Las Vegas ReviewJournal.com: Pac-12 open to possible expansion, new commissioner says

I think the italicized comment is pretty much hogwash.

I realize he is probably taking the OU/tu to SEC as a done deal and starting from that Big Picture, but the Big 12 a a minimum will not look the same - I believe it will cease to exist as a P5 conference it it exists at all -- and if the B1G is going to do anything they are going to do it in time for it to be considered in its new media rights deal.

I do not see KU still being in the Big 12 after 2025, and I truly believe ESPN is behind the scenes working to get one of its top hoops draws into a conference (B1G or ACC) where it keeps the national cachet and viewing draw (either on TV or streaming) it currently enjoys.

CURRENT P5 MEDIA CONTRACT END DATES
2023 B1G
2024 Pac-12
2025 Big 12
2034 SEC (ESPN/ABC 10 year deal)
2036 ACC