Big 12 Football: 3 programs most appealing to the PAC-12

With the Big 12 football conference looking to be on the brink of collapse following the move of the Texas Longhorns and Oklahoma Sooners to the SEC, which came to light in the public eye last month, there’s a lot of tension for that administration. Texas and Oklahoma making the move to bolt from the Big 12 for the SEC is going to have a drastic impact on both conferences.

One thing that this will spark is another round of conference realignment. There is an idea that the Big 12 could try to get into the conference expansion conversation once again. The Big 12 was forced to expand roughly one decade ago when it lost four of its original members. At the time, the choices for the Big 12 to expand were the TCU Horned Frogs and West Virginia Mountaineers.

How this conference realignment will go down for Big 12 football and the PAC-12?

What the Big 12 lost at the time was four schools including the Colorado Buffaloes (PAC-12), Nebraska Cornhuskers (Big Ten), Texas A&M Aggies (SEC), and Mizzou Tigers (SEC). Now, there are two more schools from the Big 12 leaving for the SEC, bringing the total now up to four since the turn of the century.

A real question exists as to whether the Big 12 can last in this post-Texas and Oklahoma landscape. And if the Big 12 does collapse, it looks like one of the options for the eight remaining schools will be to bolt for the PAC-12. Few other conferences around the college sports landscape could benefit from adding some of the leftovers from the Big 12 as much as the PAC-12.

Here’s a look into three of the most appealing schools from the Big 12 if the PAC-12 wants to expand in this round of conference realignment.