Is OU heading to the Big 12 exit?

If Texas A&M's recent departure from the Big 12 put the conference on life support, word came yesterday that might just move it to the terminal list. Oklahoma president David Boren announced yesterday that the Sooners are "exploring" their conference options, and have received interest from "several" conferences.

Oklahoma has been conspicuously quiet throughout the conference realignment talk over the last year, seemingly willing to go along with the Longhorns as a tandem into whatever conference they align. Now, with A&M's departure, and OU's stated announcement, it seems to me the Big 12 has reached a crossroads - more accurately, a dead end.

OU AD Joe Castiglione served this week on a board to assess expansion to get the Big 12 back to at least ten, if not twelve, teams. Rumors circulating throughout the media indicated that BYU was prime among the expansion targets, but Oklahoma sports station WWLS reported late last week that the Cougars said "thanks, but no thanks." That Boren made his announcement about OU's future conference alignment shortly thereafter speaks volumes - with BYU saying no, and OU a member of the expansion team, there's an implicit admission that there aren't any teams of high enough caliber interested in joining the flailing and failing Big 12.

Talk radio speculation swirled that other schools such as Pitt, Lousiville, SMU, and Houston were either interested in or likely candidates for Big 12 expansion. It says here that the Big 12 realized that adding teams merely for the sake of numbers doesn't add value - it dilutes the league with second-tier programs, thereby diluting its value. And the previously silent Sooners finally decided it was time for them to play their own cards. That Boren mentioned OU's desire to ally itself with prestigious academic universities telegraphs the Sooners' preferred choices as either the Big Ten, which is unlikely, or the Pac 12, which was interested just last year.

There exists at least the chance that Boren's self-imposed "three-week" deadline to resolve OU's conference membership was really a clock for a prospective member such as BYU to change its mind. In reality, I think BYU is happy now as an independent, and OU's likely exit from the Big 12 will spell the end for a troubled, top-heavy conference, with too much power focused south of the Red River.

Stay tuned.