Texas A&M headed to the SEC? Stumbling blocks remain
NCAA Football programs moving from conference to conference is an annual thing and not normally a big deal. However a proposed move that would take Texas A&M from the Big 12 conference to the South Eastern Conference is causing a storm.
A move often makes sense either geographically, in that a college will move to a conference that means travel will be cut down, for competition, if a team is too strong or weak for a conference, or for financial reasons, for both the team and the conference.
However Texas A&M’s proposed move seems to have stemmed more from a bruised ego. Their Big 12 and state rivals, the Texas Longhorns, have long been the favoured team in the Big 12. The only reason the Big 12 has stayed together for so long is that Texas promised to do things more independently, including establishing their own network.
The Big 12 is adamant that A&M’s issues with the Longhorn Network, which is set up with a 20-year, $300 million deal with ESPN, are being resolved with the plan being to maintain the state rivalry and not allowing Texas to become too dominant.
Despite the talks Texas A&M did not like Texas’ new independence, believing that new financial gain and publicity would give the Longhorns a massive advantage with recruiting. With A&M believing that Texas is even more favoured in the Big 12 than before, it suggests that the Aggies will approve the vote on Monday to seek an invitation from the SEC.
However it won’t be that simple.
The New York Times has reported that all but one of SEC’s school presidents will meet to discuss the matter, and their source has said there was still a 30 to 40 percent chance that the Aggies would not be approved an invitation.
Furthermore the induction of A&M into the SEC would leave it with 13 programs, therefore requiring a 14th. An SEC official has said, “No name has been thrown out. This thing is much slower out of the chute than the media and blogs have made it.”
The SEC could also be coy on inviting the Aggies knowing that the Texas program is already tied to a contract with the Big 12. They are more likely to ask A&M to resolve their issues and any contract disputes with the Big 12 before offering a place in their conference as any controversy labelling the SEC as the agents of causing them to leave will be bad publicity.
Although the SEC didn’t approach Texas A&M, it was actually the other way around, they will be interested in the Aggies as they will immediately bring them into the Texas market.
The SEC will likely attempt to resolve the uneven number of programs by pursuing Florida State, Clemson and Missouri. However Florida State and Clemson have both reaffirmed their loyalties to the Atlantic Coast Conference and Missouri athletic director Mike Alden has refuted that no talks on a move have taken place.
Other possible teams for the SEC would be Louisville and West Virginia.
The Big 12 will go on without A&M, using Texas and Oklahoma as the two schools to front the conference but they admit the move is risky, with millions of dollars at stake that could affect students at schools like Texas, Texas Tech and Baylor.
The vote on whether Texas A&M will get an SEC invite will go ahead this week. Only time will tell whether more moves are on the way.
Article courtesy of NJ Sharrocks.