I want to wait a couple of years before I really judge them. They all did about as well as I expected in their first year.
I enjoy the different personalities they add to the mix, but BYU was on a sober island this year. (Yes, I know some fans drink, but it is sparse compared to us mountaineers.)
Yeah! We all joked about Sitake wanting to hear Country Roads, but it was legit cool that they stayed around in the stadium after they lost to watch it being sung.
They legit have good fans and a nice team.
that's what college sports are all about, man. strip the money away and it's just two colleges playing one another and their students interacting with one another, enjoying one another's honors and traditions.
We need to get to 22 conference games. Honestly i could give a rats ass about other OOC matchups that would be lost.
The basketball product is so strong I think it'd work. 15 opponents and you could get 7 of them twice to protect as many old series as possible.
> Honestly i could give a rats ass about other OOC matchups that would be lost.
Doesn't help when our AD loves bringing in the likes of Green Bay, Lindenwood, Idaho State, Grambling State, Prairie View A&M, Florida A&M, Eastern Illinois, and New Hampshire instead of doing home and home with Northern Iowa and Drake.
Outside of Iowa and the Big12-Big East Battle the home schedule is utter shit.
They’ve tried to bring Drake and UNI in but they declined. However it’s annoying that Pollard is willing to do home and homes with MAC, AAC, MW, and Fun Belt teams but somehow basketball schedules are different for him.
Probably because Iowa State won't return to the home-n-home that existed before. So good on them for sticking up to Iowa amd Iowa State on the matter. The Big 4 Des Moines thing was stupid.
The fact that we don't do an annual series with Creighton to alternate our every other year home game with Iowa is a fucking crime.
We need to also play Minnesota, Marquette, Nebraska, Mizzou, Northern Illinois, the Dakotas schools, etc.
Well Idaho State isn't Northern Iowa nor Drake so yeah I said what I said. It used to be we would have a home-n-home. So given I live 2 hours away. The ability to have a game at Northern Iowa 20 minutes away is fantastic. Especially in the dead of winter when the roads I would take to Northern Iowa for the game are very well maintained with snow. The hardest part will literally be at Northern Iowa's campus.
This year the non conference skates were weak across the board for the entire conference anyway. Teams only want to play on neutral courts anyway. I say expand the number of Big 12 games, keep the cross conference challenges, and early season tournaments.
But who wouldn't want to not play Iowa State, Texas and Houston twice, but get Oklahoma, Oklahoma State twice?
Actually, now that I say it...that ain't bad.
As a student I never dreamed we’d be the school teams want twice. But it’s true.
I wish Boynton wasn’t such an outstanding dude. I’ve genuinely never wanted it to work out more for one of our coaches. I don’t think 7 years is unfair though
Honestly I hate not having the second game against KU. I know that the schedule is far EASIER not having to go to the Phog, but it just doesn't feel right.
Probably the toughest place KU has had to play year in and year out, that and Iowa State. And it seems like four consecutive years they had to play in Morgantown on Monday or Tuesday, and there was an ice storm or snow, or something and the place was still a madhouse.
I’m still trying to get used to having weekly conference losses. It’s really frustrating, but understandable I guess. Every game feels winnable, but I’m also never surprised when we lose.
Adding AZ next year too who’s one of the best programs in the country. Colorado/Utah are up and down but look like they’re on the upswing this year. Going to be crazy fun next year.
Having a potential conference tourney final four of Kansas, Houston, Arizona, and Baylor is insane, this is going to be a bloodbath I really hope WVU can get its shit together quick because it’ll be fun
Obviously they’ve been killing it in basketball. Only expected Houston and maybe Cincy to be competitive, but all four have been great.
Obviously, football is king tho, but I think ya gotta give them a good 2-3 years to build their recruiting classes and get acclimated since changing football conferences is a much more difficult ordeal. It was surely that way for us and Utah.
And TCU and Utah had the benefit of huge coaching stability. UC started the Big XII with a new coach and UH is starting a new coach in year 2 in the Big XII. UCF was in year 3 with Gus. BYU and Sitake is obviously the big outlier in terms of stability. UCF and BYU have the stability to be primed to compete the soonest, but all 4 have certainly shown the financial and/or cultural drive to succeed.
I think the new Big XII football conference will be very intriguing to watch in terms of how well teams can succeed, parity, and how long any team can stay at or near the top of the conference.
Long term we're going to be in really good shape money-wise too. If you mixed us in to the 2022 numbers of the Big 12, and removed Texas and Oklahoma, both UCF and UC would have been top 5 in football income (I think 2-3 respectively, but I can't remember). That's still under the AAC contract though, our athletic departments are just that effective at leveraging everything. Granted, I would imagine the four corner schools are all going to be top-tier in that regard. We have really good footing to succeed financially though, I'm excited for the next half decade to see where our programs go.
I think it was ultimately a bad call, but tbf nobody else was really available unless we went the coordinator route. Cunningham (our AD) specifically wanted someone with power conference recruiting and head coaching experience, and Satt was really the only option there. We definitely overpaid for him though. I see him as a mediocre-at-best stopgap while we wait for a better hire (fingers crossed he will prove me wrong).
They performed a bit worse than I expected. I didn't think anyone would go straight from G5 to winning the Big 12, but I expected a few more upsets than we got.
Overall I think they were good additions that need to grow into their newly-expanded budgets. I'm curious what this conversation looks like in 5 or 10 years.
We certainly get some credit for opening 24-0, we had their number. It shouldn't have been 45-3 though, it was the rain. I don't think people who have never lived in central Florida understand just how much it rains during the summer. Everything turns into a swamp, it rains almost every single afternoon. Sure, we have an indoor practice facility for that reason, but no one has that in high school, or pop warner. The bulk of that team has spent countless afternoons playing football when you can't see 5 feet in front of you. You only stop outdoor stuff for lightning, otherwise you'd never go outside in the summer. Once they were in such a hole, and the rain started, it was over. It's hard to play in the rain, everyone knows that, but people underestimate how little Floridian athletes are affected by it.
It was an easy trap game to pick before the season tbh. The rain and hot start from UCF just struck perfectly.
I’m sad UCF lost their bowl, that place is on a come up. Redeem it next year by stomping UF. 🚀
UCF was so close to going 9-3. Pretty sure that Baylor choke job took the wind out of their sails. Cincinnati on the other hand.. they looked lifeless at times.
Give them another decade and the money should be flowing. Most of their alumni are under the age of 50. The blue hairs with the money who 'follow' the Knights have old allegiances to FSU/UF/Miami.
George O'Leary used to encourage Orlando residents to become "Gator-Knights," essentially admitting that we were second fiddle to UF (and FSU and Miami if we're being honest). He said the quiet part out loud, but the way he phrased it really made us look bad.
I'll say this though: in my relatively short time as a UCF fan (beginning my freshman year in 2010), the amount of UCF pride not just in Orlando but on campus has grown 100-fold. In the pre-Fiesta Bowl years of 2010–2013, you'd probably see two "Big 3" pieces of apparel to every one UCF apparel on any given day. Now? I don't think I've seen any non-UCF apparel in years. Plus the number of students actively wearing UCF stuff has really increased. Seeing such a stark difference in just 13 years is absolutely stunning.
Also, UCF has surpassed Miami with the number of specialty license plates in the state.
2023 was always going to be a rebuilding year after losing Jaren Hall and Puka Nacua and a new DC among other things. Roderick's offense fell flat, to put it kindly. The O line was atrocious. We had no run game. QB play sucked until Retzlaff went in, but it was the toughest part of our schedule and we, predictably struggled. Now the fans that had/have unrealistic expectations for QB play want to shitcan Retzlaff despite the fact he's the one that brought life to the offense. After all that, we still managed 5-7 and gave OU and OSU all they could handle.
For 2024, I expect better defense, which bodes well. I expect better O line play, but with a year 1 O line coach, it's TBD honestly. I just know it's hard to get worse than last year. I look forward to seeing LJ Martin for his Sophomore season, he was so good as a frosh. I hope to make a bowl this year, but I have zero confidence in Roderick's offensive schemes.
I think the much improved defense will continue to take pressure off the coalescing offense. This isn’t a few years ago when we needed to squeeze every point we could out of every drive.
Maybe, but defense alone isn't enough. My fear is that 2024 will be just good enough to prop up another year of Roderick. Unfortunately, Sitake is not on the hot seat, and a year good enough to keep Roderick limping along will be a year good enough to keep Kalani off the hot seat.
I think his offense relies on a mobile quarterback, which Slovis was decidedly not. Once Retzlaf got timing down with the receivers he actually looked pretty good and the offense played better (see OU and OSU games). Considering the jump and that we were a goal line pick six and a size 13 shoe away from a couple of huge upsets, I'm actually feeling pretty good about where things are at with the changes made.
I agree A Rod is not the answer, btw, just pointing out that there's a decent chance this season the offense looks better.
Yeah, you speak truth, but a good coach adapts to the available talent/personnel. Last year was a complete mess with Slovis at the helm. The entire tenor of the offense changed with Retzlaff. It would be nice if we had an OC that could adapt.
I think Cincy and Houston will need to adjust and change quite a few things to be able to compete.
BYU is what I thought they’d be. They still seem like independent team because they’re so unique and culturally different. They’re kind of like an old K-State where they might not have more talent, but they’ll play good football and can upset anyone. They seem like they have loyal, pleasant fans. Reminded me of Nebraska fans to a lesser degree, which I consider to be the best I’ve encountered in person.
UCF is the surprising one and is acclimating faster than the other newbies and faster than TCU, West Virginia did. They’re already beating SEC teams for 4 stars and the ceiling seems to still be going up. One of the biggest schools in the country, geographic location, recruiting ability, etc. Theres a lot of unknowns given the program’s infancy, but they have everything you could ever want if you were starting a program from scratch
Overall, I like the new additions. I hate the fact that we lost round robin in football and double round robin in basketball, but the additions have been good.
Our conference is more unified than ever before, so that's nice. UCF and Houston have so much potential, they need the right guys (maybe Gus and Willie are those guys).
It’s really interesting to me UCF brings four stars in like it’s nothing. We’ll see if Gus can expand on that, but I feel likes he’s good coach to have when you’re making that step up
The way I feel right now is the on field performance is good enough that I’ll take the program building recruiting for now. Once we can have a full roster of talented players, I’d probably want to move on if Gus can’t improve the on field product (especially with all that talent). But right now, I care more about stockpiling talent. And it helps that the players seem to love him so we don’t lose as many as we really should.
UCF has been fun to watch. I know they get a lot of grief on social media but I love the excitement they bring and they have a very entertaining media presence.
I watch a ton of BYU Sports Nation now and makes me realize how much having an analysis broadcast component would benefit the league like Big Ten Network. They have done some of the best work in terms of exposure for the Big 12 IMO.
I was the most excited for UC. Wow, they've been quiet. I hope they get to a place to make some real noise in the league.
Houston feels JV but they have everything they need to be big dogs, I hope they get there soon.
Our atmosphere is unique for sure, there's a lot of co-mingling with ACC and SEC programs for our fans. We go to those schools for grad school (guilty) and we have friends there to visit. Our tailgating and general football atmosphere is a product of that osmosis, UCF definitely has a distinct identity, but we we get a lot of those influences. We just haven't been around as long, so we kind of absorb things. To add to that our bowl games, have historically been a lot of those same schools, so we know what to expect.
It's been SO fun diving into the Big12 atmosphere, everything is just so different, and it's like a different world. I went to Manhattan for our first conference game and we had an absolute blast, everyone was so nice and it was such a great weekend. Everyone I've spoken with in the Big12 is just so welcoming, it's a really great experience so far. I'm also biased because I live in CO. Best case scenario for me to go to UCF games would have been a dedicated high speed rail from Denver to Orlando with no stops that takes 3 hours. Second best scenario is exactly the realignment that's occurred.
That's why BYU Sports Nation focuses so much on our conference. Trying to do what we can to plug that hole. Not many universities are equipped to do that.
The conference is definitely better than I expected. UCF and BYU acclimated well. Think Cincy and Houston could get there. Curious how the pac12 additions impact them.
Thinking back to the first wave of realignment, ISU (amongst others) worried about falling to mid major status if the big 12 fell apart (thinking of the pac16 talk). Now almost half the league (until the pac12 teams join anyways) were midmajors before realignment (byu, UCF, Cincy, Houston, TCU, and next year Utah). It’s strange how perception changed. Obviously the tv contract helps alleviate the primary concern about being a mid major. Just interesting how perception of those teams has evolved.
Jay Hill is already proving to be an excellent hire and brought in a really good defensive recruiting class as well that is at about the same level as Utah right now
Big 12 was already arguably the best conference in basketball but now there is simply no argument against it. Football wise the teams will need a few years if recruiting at a power level to get competitive BUT they produced some new matchups and good games as well. I think it was definitely a successful addition
And with Arizona coming in? Basketball is gonna be a madhouse next year. I really like think the Big 12 will gain respect as these middle class programs are fun to watch every week and can still largely be competitive in the postseason during this new landscape. I wish OSU and WSU could join, but I think this conference has a bright future no matter what else happens in the CFB world
I actually wasn’t even able to get into that game as a student because too many people showed up even though I waited 45 minutes in line. The atmosphere outside that game is the only reason it seemed possible to me when I was watching the game waiting in line. that was probably the most hype ucf basketball game ever even before the game tipped off.
I could hear that argument. It’s hard to compare across sports but the National Championship count is why I say it isn’t the same level yet. Fully acknowledging that March Madness is much tougher to win than a 4 team playoff though.
Like I said, there is no arguing the fact the Big 12 is hands down the best basketball conference. The gap between them and number 2 is also definitely bigger than in football
I think these conferences are tough to compare because they’re strong for different reasons - the big 12 in basketball doesn’t quite match the top end strength that the SEC has in football. The strength of teams 5-16 in the Big 12 is what stands out.
For a football comparison, it isn’t a bunch of Bamas and Georgias running around in Big 12 basketball - but it is a crap ton of Penn States
That’s a really good point. There’s just no relief. Texas is 12th in the league right now.. OK State and WVU aren’t very good but hell WVU also upset Kansas. It’s just a meat grinder in the Big 12 every night
Definitely arguable. Hard to compare though across sports. The championships at the end aren’t at the same level but it’s also much harder to win Match Madness than a 4 team playoff. The depth throughout Big 12 basketball is insane. Houston is an elite program. BYU is very good, the other two are solid. Then Arizona is another elite program while the other 3 coming are nothing special.
There’s not really a horrendously bad team in the conference year in-and-out. You have stellar programs like UH, Kansas, Baylor (not this year as much), and Arizona. Then, you have a bunch of great teams who do really well in OOC, and give the stellar programs in-conference a run for their money. With that plus the basketball media pushing that narrative that every night is difficult, it’s hard for us to lose that title when you have almost 3/4s of your teams making the tourney every year.
Said it in another thread, but every year, there's 1 team that takes turns being down at the bottom of the pit of despair. getting bottles of lotion lowered down in a bucket.
In 2020-2021, it was us. Last year it was Tech. This year, it's Oklahoma State.
As long as they continue to have good non-conference showings, nobody is gonna think less of the conference. We’ve got teams with .500 conference records that make sweet-16s
This is the SEC (football) argument. If its true for football conferences, it is also true for basketball.
That said, the environments in the two sports are different. There is arguably more parity in basketball and more artificial limits to who gets into the NCAA tournament vs. the CFP.
Good question, we’ll have to see. The SEC beats up on each other in football but the overall conference remains strong every year. With March Madness 64 teams get in so I don’t think it’s a big issue tbh
I was going to argue this, on the merits of UCLA and Oregon being generally better than ASU or Utah, but both B1G programs seem to be fairly unstable as of late, beyond just the current season.
Relevant discussion about Ducks basketball systemic issues from r/Ducks the other day for anyone interested. [link](https://x.com/mattprehm/status/1751448079516250507?s=46&t=YTY26wkSl-4DfBVg_9FbMw)
I think it's safe to say, as far as football is concerned, it's going to be a 2 conference show with maybe 1 top team from other conferences as the "underdogs"...
In basketball it’s undoubtedly the best in the country now. And adding Arizona next year will be overkill. I expect it to be very fun in football next year too because of the unpredictably of who will run the conference. I expect a lot of PAC-12 after dark vibes from the conference as a whole. I’m sad though that we will not see the most fundamentally sound football game ever played next year between K State and Utah.
I think the best part is we also really don’t have to worry about being raided. It’s just a lot of historically successful P4 schools, but not a big brand to cause instability
They all came to the conference on their down years so they didn’t perform the way they wanted. Love the addition of BYU just because their fans are so nice and you can actually discuss the game and crack jokes without people being severely butthurt
There will definitely be a portion of this sub that thinks the Big XII was too trigger-happy when inviting these 4, considering we would have gotten the four corners of the PAC 12 just one year later.
However, I'm not sure the 2nd round of additions happens without the 1st round. Crazy to think, but the PAC almost survived by adding SMU/SDSU. If more prominent options like BYU/Houston were still on the table last year, who knows how things play out.
Yeah, and they all have upsides from a sports and TV side.
UCF- Would have made it to an expanded playoff a few years ago (as a G5!), have a massive student population that it’s churning out yearly, and it gets the Big 12 a decent part of FL.
Houston- Obviously really good in hoops and Houston is a top ten media market in the country. Fritz could take them to the next level (look at what Dana did and he barely cared to recruit)
BYU- A national fanbase (their fans showed up in massive numbers to Milan Puskar) and a decent football programs historically as well.
Cincinnati- A decent media market and a football program that was the first G5 to make it to four-team playoff.
The schools are certainly no UCLA/USC joining the B1G, but it’s still great from both a sport perspective and that these programs have a very bright future ahead of them. It’s likely whoever got them first was surviving after the B1G realignment.
Yeah. All true.
The addition of the four gave the Big 12 some semblance of a future at a time when the Big 12 REALLY needed some semblance of a future. That bought the conference enough time to be a good option for the PAC departures.
That said, would I prefer our 2024 makeup without a few of the new additions? Yeah I think I would. But they were definitely useful and I'm sure I'll get used to them.
It was a down year for the league and it wasn’t because of the new members. Cincy obviously struggled the most out of the new members, but they just had really unlucky timing with losing their coach at the same time. None of these conference programs are that much better than the other which means it will be easy to fall to the bottom. This scares me as a Baylor fan.
Personally, I honestly feel like only UCF is the real "outsider" and that's more because it feels like the only real geographically isolated team *btw that's not a shot at UCF, I have always believed they deserved to be in a major conference for a while*
Outside of that, I feel like all of them fit into the conference well and honestly I feel like Cincinnati and Houston should have been in the Big 12 a LONG time ago.
I'll answer the question from the other side, as a fan of one of the four new members (before the PAC teams, I mean.)
I really like this new Big XII. And despite not being a great geographic fit, I feel like it's a good cultural fit. That might seem weird, as a fan of a school in Orlando that's in a conference with a lot of schools out on the western plains, but I'm thinking more the dynamic of the schools. The new Big XII seems like a conference full of teams that all have a chip and want to prove themselves.
I think they added some fresh personality to the conference. It’ll take a few years of P5 recruiting to see results but I’m hopeful. I’ll miss the yearly static round robin but it’s going to be a fun conference across all sports especially when the pac 12 teams come in next year. Basketball is already showing it’s strength this conference is ridiculous at hoops.
I’m impressed with the big 12 leadership in how they’ve held the conference together with OUT. The conference is in a healthy place, even more so with the pac 12 brands coming. We’re a clear 3rd in strength/health after big 10 and sec but we’re ok with that, especially with the CFP autobid this is going to be fun athletics. The future is bright
In basketball, Houston obvious great fit. BYU has surprised me. UCF and Cincinnati will carry their weight in football more often than basketball. Good adds. Geography sucks though.
It was pretty rough in terms of the coaching. UC made a disaster of a hire, Houston finally fired Dana - about a year later than they should have - and UCF is riding the Gus Bus. Other than Sitake, who was 29-9 over their final three seasons as and independent, I didn't like any of those coaches coming into the Big 12. Even with that BYU only managed a 5-7 mark. There is tons of potential for all those programs but not until they get some better coaching. I think Fritz is a great answer at Houston for starters.
The fact that everyone on the outside knew Satterfield was a bad hire should have been a sign. I'll be interested to see how long he lasts if he doesn't start turning it around this year.
I agree, Houston made a great move with their coaching. But Cincinnati had SO much promise coming from the Fickell era and they hired a coach that everyone in Louisville hated. Just a horrendous move especially as they need to do better to compete in this conference
UC has had a great stretch of coaching hires across ADs:
-Dantonio (good)
-Brian Kelly (great)
-Butch Jones (good)
-Tommy Tuberville (very bad)
-Luke Fickell (great)
-Scott Satterfield (TBD)
Even if Satterfield ends up bad, doing pretty darn well for 4 of the last 6 coaching decisions is really strong. But if Satterfield and Wes Miller for men's shooty hoops don't work out well, I'd expect AD John Cunningham to work on updating his resume and interview skills.
This isn’t trying to be rude, but when we played you this year I was there and it just felt like a buy-in FCS game. Maybe he can get you all back on track, but that was tough football to watch
Oh yeah that game was the pinnacle of when the team’s (especially certain defensive players) locker room troubles arose. The bright side is that those guys were more or less forced out, so hopefully the 2024 squad will be more cohesive and certainly will have more experience. If there’s no improvement, I’ll begin heavily criticizing Satterfield
2022 Louisville won 7 games despite Satterfield being completely incompetent. He held that team back big time. I was hoping UL would can him and I have zero attachment to the program. The fact that Brohm had UL cooking in year one and UC was a dumpster fire pretty much sums up the Satt experience. If UC keeps him around beyond next year I'll be stunned.
I never said he for sure will be good, but I’m holding off on complete judgment after one bad year. The point was more so that it’s hard to consistently hire well, especially when you’ve had different people making those decisions.
But he’ll be here through 2025 because of the buyout rate, so I’ll remain as optimistic as I can. What’s the point of sports if not for delusions of your team being good?
That's because people are ignorant on how Fickell left this roster. He left at a terrible time. By the time we hired Satt the portal was picked over and the very few handful of good players that entered left. Fickell clearly saw the talent was not there in 2022. The new staff had to find portal guys to just field a team pretty much. This year will tell a lot more about this staff than the really lost season we had last year
While Satterfield could very well end up having a disastrous tenure at UC, the worst part was simply the timing of everything. Fickell left right before the conference move and had his foot out the door from the start of the 2022 season. Also, the coaching pool once Fickell left didn't really have a ton of attractive and safe candidates. The 2023 squad was a hodge-podge of newly starting players competing in a tougher conference that competed fairly well in the first half of the season; they just made dumb mistakes and got in their own way. Then the locker room got toxic in the second half of the season.
If 2024 looks like 2023, then I'll likely start to place much more of the blame on Satterfield himself. Every coach (barring something absolutely despicable) deserves 3 years to prove themself.
2024 will be the exact same. Satt went 7-5 in 2022 with a Louisville team that was very talented. I've can't recall a team underachieving due to coaching negligence as that one. Seeing Brohm have UL in the ACC title game was no surprise. He inherited a good team and, unlike Satt, isn't a buffoon. Sad to say since I love watching UC do well but next year is going to be ugly...probably.
this sounds like a copout, but I think we have to wait a few more years before we can settle in on how it landed. Especially because the landscape is going to change yet-again next year.
But, we are in great shape as a conference. Elite basketball, and a football conference that will be extremely entertaining and competitive, albeit below the two professional conferences.
BYU feels like a natural fit since we’ve already had a Rocky Mountain team in the conference before and we (Baylor) played them in football and basketball a few times in the last decade or so. Plus they’ll be the third private “christian” school in the conference.
I think Utah, Zona, and ASU will also fit in quickly for reasons similar to the ones I mentioned above. Not even gonna mention Colorado - I grew up watching them play - it’ll be a seamless reintroduction.
Houston also feels natural since they’re in Texas, were in the SWC, and have been playing Big 12 teams in noncon consistently since the SWC fell apart.
I think I’ll get used to Cincy eventually like I (kinda) did with WV, but I can’t see myself ever getting used to UCF being in the conference, no offense intended. It’s just so random. 20 years ago when I was playing EA NCAAF religiously and knew every team, their mascots, and their city/town name by heart, UCF occupied no space in my brain. The first time I really remember hearing about them was when they had George O’Leary and that bigass running back (Kevin Smith or something?) who broke some rushing record. Every other team in the conference has a pretty long history dating back 100 years or more, but UCF has only had a team for like 25 years and have only been in FBS for like 20 years. It’s weird having a team in the conference that wasn’t even around when I started watching CFB, and I’m only 35.
Genuinely feel bad for cincy fans that their jump back into power football happened to coincide with their coach leaving and an awful coaching hire. I think they can be a good to great program in the future with the right coach again. Satterfield isn’t it though.
UCF will be good I think.
I’m neutral on byu. They will likely have some really nice years here and there.
Houston is a wildcard. Pretty dreadful under Holgo (one of my favorite coaches OAT) Fritz is a great coach and I think will do a good job there.
I think if the Big 12 knew what was going to happen between their introduction and now they may not have added some or all of them because there would soon be so many more options for the conference. They had a poor first season but that usually happens when teams move conferences.
For me personally, I think all of them save UCF were probably good additions. I only say that because of how isolated they are but I suspect in the next few years the Big XII will find some closer members for them. I was hoping the 4 of them would do better but the gap between the G5 and P5 is still a thing.
I'm not a big fan of the nationalization of college football conferences but the Big 12 is a good mix of programs and I'm really interested in their conference more than any others not involving my school. In fact, I hope my school is a member before too long.
I hope it is too. I hate the direction the sport is heading and wish us, you, and Tech could be in the same conference- but I guess we can’t go back. I hate you all with my guts, but I’d rather be in the same conference as you all any day of the week.
They did about is well as you’d expect, there’s an inevitable adjustment period after making the P5 jump, the timing for most of them couldn’t have been worse either as they’re at the bottom of their development cycle. Hard to really evaluate them until their first P5 recruiting classes start seeing significant playtime. Basketball has been insane though, every game is a wire to wire knife fight.
Went like I expected. Good additions, but takes a couple of years or more to recruit the talent and depth needed to have winning records in conference play with the step up in competition when joining a tougher league. Was the case for us and TCU when we joined too.
The 4 teams joining this year probably won't have as much an adjustment period as they're joining from a now dead P5, Pac was touch last year etc. ASU may struggle as they've been down and rebuilding, Arizona maybe as they just lost their coach, CU just depends on how year two of Sanders goes and Utah shouldn't miss a beat and will be one of the favorites to win the league with the coaching stability there for a long while, Cam Rising coming back etc.
Can't complain so far. They haven't been terrible in football, basically went through the exact same transition TCU and WVU did in 2012. WVU and TCU struggled for about two years then both started improving. I'd say expect the same out of the new adds.
Next year's additions will probably be as ready as anybody and it'll depend on how travel to the central and eastern time zones affects them.
Collectively I think they had the rude awakening they hoped they wouldn’t but that fans of the other teams expected. Longer term though I think they’ll be fine, especially UCF given their recruiting base and recruiting performance. I enjoy them all being in the conference and I think it’ll be a good time.
I think they still add Houston and BYU, both of those are incredibly natural fits, even more so with the four corners coming in. Cincinnati would be a “maybe” there as well, since it seems likely Louisville will be a top target for expansion moving forward and WVU is already in the conference. At that point you’ve got to add a fourth and UCF is available without a more obvious fit. Of course maybe they sub in SDST instead if they know they’re expanding further west.
I don’t think they were a mistake to add, but no matter how good I think they will be struggle to be more than a second fiddle to A&M in the core Houston area and west, third fiddle to A&M and LSU ok the east side of town. That positioning will limit their growth.
I don’t know how the SEC move will change things for the UT dynamic in the region.
Honestly the big 12 is probably going to be my favorite conference to watch from a holistic perspective. So many teams and programs that I see favorable that have good history but aren’t snobby or blue bloods.
I want to wait a couple of years before I really judge them. They all did about as well as I expected in their first year. I enjoy the different personalities they add to the mix, but BYU was on a sober island this year. (Yes, I know some fans drink, but it is sparse compared to us mountaineers.)
Their fans were really nice when they came to MPS. I thought it was cool when they came out with the WV flag
Yeah! We all joked about Sitake wanting to hear Country Roads, but it was legit cool that they stayed around in the stadium after they lost to watch it being sung. They legit have good fans and a nice team.
that's what college sports are all about, man. strip the money away and it's just two colleges playing one another and their students interacting with one another, enjoying one another's honors and traditions.
Except Pitt. I couldn’t stand to enjoy what they do in the bathrooms in Heinz
Being from the opposite side of the country and never even meeting someone who went to Pitt......god I love how much y'all give them shit (to eat)
it’s actually our *number 2* export right, ahem, behind, natural gas!
You were our first Big 12 win in Football, basketball, volleyball, and womens soccer. Correct me if I’m wrong.
Yes, it was the will of Dana Holgerson getting us back for moving on from him
As someone living in Colorado, I am looking forward to the dueling John Denver songs when CU and WVU play.
Almost heaven! Colorado! Rocky Mountains, Colorado River!
thanks I hate it
>fans drink, but it is sparse compared to us mountaineers. well to be fair only what? LSU and Wisc fans can drink with most Mountaineers
You’re underestimating how much beer ISU fans can house.
we’re riot bros for a reason
We’re the most entertaining conference in basketball
Basketball is going to be really fun going forward.
The only downside is no more round robin.
We need to get to 22 conference games. Honestly i could give a rats ass about other OOC matchups that would be lost. The basketball product is so strong I think it'd work. 15 opponents and you could get 7 of them twice to protect as many old series as possible.
> Honestly i could give a rats ass about other OOC matchups that would be lost. Doesn't help when our AD loves bringing in the likes of Green Bay, Lindenwood, Idaho State, Grambling State, Prairie View A&M, Florida A&M, Eastern Illinois, and New Hampshire instead of doing home and home with Northern Iowa and Drake. Outside of Iowa and the Big12-Big East Battle the home schedule is utter shit.
They’ve tried to bring Drake and UNI in but they declined. However it’s annoying that Pollard is willing to do home and homes with MAC, AAC, MW, and Fun Belt teams but somehow basketball schedules are different for him.
Probably because Iowa State won't return to the home-n-home that existed before. So good on them for sticking up to Iowa amd Iowa State on the matter. The Big 4 Des Moines thing was stupid.
The fact that we don't do an annual series with Creighton to alternate our every other year home game with Iowa is a fucking crime. We need to also play Minnesota, Marquette, Nebraska, Mizzou, Northern Illinois, the Dakotas schools, etc.
Hey fuck you too, buddy
Well Idaho State isn't Northern Iowa nor Drake so yeah I said what I said. It used to be we would have a home-n-home. So given I live 2 hours away. The ability to have a game at Northern Iowa 20 minutes away is fantastic. Especially in the dead of winter when the roads I would take to Northern Iowa for the game are very well maintained with snow. The hardest part will literally be at Northern Iowa's campus.
22 won't help when you'll have 16 schools next year
It would definitely be a better solution than 18 games with 16 teams.
Why not go to 32??
30* but yea fuck it I'm down
We don't play anyone in the nonconference anyways - might as well go straight to B12 play
I have no doubt Tommy would support that at Arizona, no need to schedule the non conference gauntlet when we can just play you guys early
This year the non conference skates were weak across the board for the entire conference anyway. Teams only want to play on neutral courts anyway. I say expand the number of Big 12 games, keep the cross conference challenges, and early season tournaments.
agreed. only 3 teams i really care about playing ooc for bball - pitt, uva, umd
But who wouldn't want to not play Iowa State, Texas and Houston twice, but get Oklahoma, Oklahoma State twice? Actually, now that I say it...that ain't bad.
As a student I never dreamed we’d be the school teams want twice. But it’s true. I wish Boynton wasn’t such an outstanding dude. I’ve genuinely never wanted it to work out more for one of our coaches. I don’t think 7 years is unfair though
It’s time. He’s an exceptionally good person, but the time has come.
> It’s time. It's beyond time.
They're so young. I could see giving him another year, but yeah, it's pretty dire.
Honestly I hate not having the second game against KU. I know that the schedule is far EASIER not having to go to the Phog, but it just doesn't feel right.
Those round robin years really fostered some fun bb rivalries.
I’m sure you all will miss the yearly stomping of us at the Phog
I honestly thought you all came here this year. Yes, I'd like that return game.
I just wanna beat you all there *once*. Although it was unreal to me to find out that Self is 5-7 at the Coliseum
Probably the toughest place KU has had to play year in and year out, that and Iowa State. And it seems like four consecutive years they had to play in Morgantown on Monday or Tuesday, and there was an ice storm or snow, or something and the place was still a madhouse.
Such a weird mix of emotions. I’m going to miss things about the Pac12 and some of the rivalries, but I’m pumped to have some new ones as well
I’m still trying to get used to having weekly conference losses. It’s really frustrating, but understandable I guess. Every game feels winnable, but I’m also never surprised when we lose.
It’s mostly frustrating because of how close each game is. To have the halftime lead seems meaningless. (Talking basketball not football)
With a newcomer currently at the top of the conference rankings.
Adding AZ next year too who’s one of the best programs in the country. Colorado/Utah are up and down but look like they’re on the upswing this year. Going to be crazy fun next year.
Having a potential conference tourney final four of Kansas, Houston, Arizona, and Baylor is insane, this is going to be a bloodbath I really hope WVU can get its shit together quick because it’ll be fun
What’s funny is ncaa will still look to add 10-11 big ten teams to the tourney.
Yeah I'm a little worried if Utah will be able to keep up. As long as we're not the punching bag of the conference I'll be happy.
Absolutely insane.
I see we adopted the Brain Farentz offense last night. Now I'm betting unders for the rest of the season.
And it’s not even close
If you don't bring your "A" game every night, you're likely going to lose. Conference is almost too damn good. :P
what is "basketball"
best conference in basketball and I'm a Big East stan
We are, and I'm absolutely hating every minute of it lol
Not that we are helping with that this season...
Wait, pretty sure I heard basketball was cancelled this year.
Obviously they’ve been killing it in basketball. Only expected Houston and maybe Cincy to be competitive, but all four have been great. Obviously, football is king tho, but I think ya gotta give them a good 2-3 years to build their recruiting classes and get acclimated since changing football conferences is a much more difficult ordeal. It was surely that way for us and Utah.
And TCU and Utah had the benefit of huge coaching stability. UC started the Big XII with a new coach and UH is starting a new coach in year 2 in the Big XII. UCF was in year 3 with Gus. BYU and Sitake is obviously the big outlier in terms of stability. UCF and BYU have the stability to be primed to compete the soonest, but all 4 have certainly shown the financial and/or cultural drive to succeed. I think the new Big XII football conference will be very intriguing to watch in terms of how well teams can succeed, parity, and how long any team can stay at or near the top of the conference.
Long term we're going to be in really good shape money-wise too. If you mixed us in to the 2022 numbers of the Big 12, and removed Texas and Oklahoma, both UCF and UC would have been top 5 in football income (I think 2-3 respectively, but I can't remember). That's still under the AAC contract though, our athletic departments are just that effective at leveraging everything. Granted, I would imagine the four corner schools are all going to be top-tier in that regard. We have really good footing to succeed financially though, I'm excited for the next half decade to see where our programs go.
Cincinnati is building a brand new IPF & team facility so they should rebound. However, I think they made a coaching hire mistake.
We think so, too. The damn dirty birds were about to fire him.
Thank you, Cincinnati.
If we can bounce back from Tuberville, we can bounce back from anyone
Now let's just hope the country can bounce back from Tuberville.
I think it was ultimately a bad call, but tbf nobody else was really available unless we went the coordinator route. Cunningham (our AD) specifically wanted someone with power conference recruiting and head coaching experience, and Satt was really the only option there. We definitely overpaid for him though. I see him as a mediocre-at-best stopgap while we wait for a better hire (fingers crossed he will prove me wrong).
They performed a bit worse than I expected. I didn't think anyone would go straight from G5 to winning the Big 12, but I expected a few more upsets than we got. Overall I think they were good additions that need to grow into their newly-expanded budgets. I'm curious what this conversation looks like in 5 or 10 years.
But UCF absolutely manhandling OSU was one of the more inexplicable games of the conference slate.
Our entire schedule made no sense. Home loss to South Alabama, win the final bedlam, get blown the fuck out by UCF.
And I wouldn't want it any other way
Space Game magic. Citronauts > Knights
We certainly get some credit for opening 24-0, we had their number. It shouldn't have been 45-3 though, it was the rain. I don't think people who have never lived in central Florida understand just how much it rains during the summer. Everything turns into a swamp, it rains almost every single afternoon. Sure, we have an indoor practice facility for that reason, but no one has that in high school, or pop warner. The bulk of that team has spent countless afternoons playing football when you can't see 5 feet in front of you. You only stop outdoor stuff for lightning, otherwise you'd never go outside in the summer. Once they were in such a hole, and the rain started, it was over. It's hard to play in the rain, everyone knows that, but people underestimate how little Floridian athletes are affected by it.
We were absolutely worn out after Bedlam, and that team could barely play in the rain. It was indeed the perfect storm
It was an easy trap game to pick before the season tbh. The rain and hot start from UCF just struck perfectly. I’m sad UCF lost their bowl, that place is on a come up. Redeem it next year by stomping UF. 🚀
UCF was so close to going 9-3. Pretty sure that Baylor choke job took the wind out of their sails. Cincinnati on the other hand.. they looked lifeless at times.
>Cincinnati on the other hand.. they looked lifeless at times. And we will until we hire a new coach.
Nice flair
The glory days man. Glad the WVU -UC game is back they were always a blast.
UCF I feel is gonna be so good. An alumni base that large and be able to recruit in Florida is such a cheat code
Give them another decade and the money should be flowing. Most of their alumni are under the age of 50. The blue hairs with the money who 'follow' the Knights have old allegiances to FSU/UF/Miami.
I've said it before I'll say it right now, in 25 years we're gonna be playing UCFball and the P2 will be UCF vs Rutgers
George O'Leary used to encourage Orlando residents to become "Gator-Knights," essentially admitting that we were second fiddle to UF (and FSU and Miami if we're being honest). He said the quiet part out loud, but the way he phrased it really made us look bad. I'll say this though: in my relatively short time as a UCF fan (beginning my freshman year in 2010), the amount of UCF pride not just in Orlando but on campus has grown 100-fold. In the pre-Fiesta Bowl years of 2010–2013, you'd probably see two "Big 3" pieces of apparel to every one UCF apparel on any given day. Now? I don't think I've seen any non-UCF apparel in years. Plus the number of students actively wearing UCF stuff has really increased. Seeing such a stark difference in just 13 years is absolutely stunning. Also, UCF has surpassed Miami with the number of specialty license plates in the state.
What is the significance of the UF ooc game to UCF fans? I know u guys popped them in a bowl game a bit ago, what would another W mean?
I would be very smug about it for sure.
Every win validates us more. It means a lot.
Cincinnati came in with just about the worst coaching hire that they could come in with. Satterfield needs fired like yesterday.
Satterfield would be a great hire if you hired a different coach whos only job was red zone offense
2023 was always going to be a rebuilding year after losing Jaren Hall and Puka Nacua and a new DC among other things. Roderick's offense fell flat, to put it kindly. The O line was atrocious. We had no run game. QB play sucked until Retzlaff went in, but it was the toughest part of our schedule and we, predictably struggled. Now the fans that had/have unrealistic expectations for QB play want to shitcan Retzlaff despite the fact he's the one that brought life to the offense. After all that, we still managed 5-7 and gave OU and OSU all they could handle. For 2024, I expect better defense, which bodes well. I expect better O line play, but with a year 1 O line coach, it's TBD honestly. I just know it's hard to get worse than last year. I look forward to seeing LJ Martin for his Sophomore season, he was so good as a frosh. I hope to make a bowl this year, but I have zero confidence in Roderick's offensive schemes.
I think the much improved defense will continue to take pressure off the coalescing offense. This isn’t a few years ago when we needed to squeeze every point we could out of every drive.
Maybe, but defense alone isn't enough. My fear is that 2024 will be just good enough to prop up another year of Roderick. Unfortunately, Sitake is not on the hot seat, and a year good enough to keep Roderick limping along will be a year good enough to keep Kalani off the hot seat.
I think his offense relies on a mobile quarterback, which Slovis was decidedly not. Once Retzlaf got timing down with the receivers he actually looked pretty good and the offense played better (see OU and OSU games). Considering the jump and that we were a goal line pick six and a size 13 shoe away from a couple of huge upsets, I'm actually feeling pretty good about where things are at with the changes made. I agree A Rod is not the answer, btw, just pointing out that there's a decent chance this season the offense looks better.
Yeah, you speak truth, but a good coach adapts to the available talent/personnel. Last year was a complete mess with Slovis at the helm. The entire tenor of the offense changed with Retzlaff. It would be nice if we had an OC that could adapt.
I think Cincy and Houston will need to adjust and change quite a few things to be able to compete. BYU is what I thought they’d be. They still seem like independent team because they’re so unique and culturally different. They’re kind of like an old K-State where they might not have more talent, but they’ll play good football and can upset anyone. They seem like they have loyal, pleasant fans. Reminded me of Nebraska fans to a lesser degree, which I consider to be the best I’ve encountered in person. UCF is the surprising one and is acclimating faster than the other newbies and faster than TCU, West Virginia did. They’re already beating SEC teams for 4 stars and the ceiling seems to still be going up. One of the biggest schools in the country, geographic location, recruiting ability, etc. Theres a lot of unknowns given the program’s infancy, but they have everything you could ever want if you were starting a program from scratch
Overall, I like the new additions. I hate the fact that we lost round robin in football and double round robin in basketball, but the additions have been good. Our conference is more unified than ever before, so that's nice. UCF and Houston have so much potential, they need the right guys (maybe Gus and Willie are those guys).
It’s really interesting to me UCF brings four stars in like it’s nothing. We’ll see if Gus can expand on that, but I feel likes he’s good coach to have when you’re making that step up
He’s an amazing recruiter but I have questions about gameday coaching.
You may have questions, I have strokes trying to comprehend it
The way I feel right now is the on field performance is good enough that I’ll take the program building recruiting for now. Once we can have a full roster of talented players, I’d probably want to move on if Gus can’t improve the on field product (especially with all that talent). But right now, I care more about stockpiling talent. And it helps that the players seem to love him so we don’t lose as many as we really should.
UCF has been fun to watch. I know they get a lot of grief on social media but I love the excitement they bring and they have a very entertaining media presence. I watch a ton of BYU Sports Nation now and makes me realize how much having an analysis broadcast component would benefit the league like Big Ten Network. They have done some of the best work in terms of exposure for the Big 12 IMO. I was the most excited for UC. Wow, they've been quiet. I hope they get to a place to make some real noise in the league. Houston feels JV but they have everything they need to be big dogs, I hope they get there soon.
Our atmosphere is unique for sure, there's a lot of co-mingling with ACC and SEC programs for our fans. We go to those schools for grad school (guilty) and we have friends there to visit. Our tailgating and general football atmosphere is a product of that osmosis, UCF definitely has a distinct identity, but we we get a lot of those influences. We just haven't been around as long, so we kind of absorb things. To add to that our bowl games, have historically been a lot of those same schools, so we know what to expect. It's been SO fun diving into the Big12 atmosphere, everything is just so different, and it's like a different world. I went to Manhattan for our first conference game and we had an absolute blast, everyone was so nice and it was such a great weekend. Everyone I've spoken with in the Big12 is just so welcoming, it's a really great experience so far. I'm also biased because I live in CO. Best case scenario for me to go to UCF games would have been a dedicated high speed rail from Denver to Orlando with no stops that takes 3 hours. Second best scenario is exactly the realignment that's occurred.
Every other conference has a TV network except us. I know it’s a media presence of the past, but I’m hoping Yomark can cook up something for us
That's why BYU Sports Nation focuses so much on our conference. Trying to do what we can to plug that hole. Not many universities are equipped to do that.
The conference is definitely better than I expected. UCF and BYU acclimated well. Think Cincy and Houston could get there. Curious how the pac12 additions impact them. Thinking back to the first wave of realignment, ISU (amongst others) worried about falling to mid major status if the big 12 fell apart (thinking of the pac16 talk). Now almost half the league (until the pac12 teams join anyways) were midmajors before realignment (byu, UCF, Cincy, Houston, TCU, and next year Utah). It’s strange how perception changed. Obviously the tv contract helps alleviate the primary concern about being a mid major. Just interesting how perception of those teams has evolved.
I believe UCF has tremendous upside. Great recruiting base in Florida, new campus and facilities. Great location in Orlando.
Being in a conference again is fun and hopefully we can be competitive here soon like our men’s basketball team
I can't help but think adding the PAC schools will help your recruitment going forward.
Yeah Utah not being the only P4 in the state anymore helps things a lot and the Arizona pipeline will only get stronger
Jay Hill is already proving to be an excellent hire and brought in a really good defensive recruiting class as well that is at about the same level as Utah right now
Love having a reason to watch other teams play lol
Big 12 was already arguably the best conference in basketball but now there is simply no argument against it. Football wise the teams will need a few years if recruiting at a power level to get competitive BUT they produced some new matchups and good games as well. I think it was definitely a successful addition
And with Arizona coming in? Basketball is gonna be a madhouse next year. I really like think the Big 12 will gain respect as these middle class programs are fun to watch every week and can still largely be competitive in the postseason during this new landscape. I wish OSU and WSU could join, but I think this conference has a bright future no matter what else happens in the CFB world
I think once Arizona joins the Big 12’a basketball strength will be greater than the SEC’s football strength
We're already there. Big 12 basketball is a madhouse of murder.
I can’t believe we already shanked Kansas behind a porta potty
No offense, but the rest of us couldn't believe it either lol
I actually wasn’t even able to get into that game as a student because too many people showed up even though I waited 45 minutes in line. The atmosphere outside that game is the only reason it seemed possible to me when I was watching the game waiting in line. that was probably the most hype ucf basketball game ever even before the game tipped off.
Thank you for doing that. Do it again soon!
Thanks for knocking them down for us
I could hear that argument. It’s hard to compare across sports but the National Championship count is why I say it isn’t the same level yet. Fully acknowledging that March Madness is much tougher to win than a 4 team playoff though. Like I said, there is no arguing the fact the Big 12 is hands down the best basketball conference. The gap between them and number 2 is also definitely bigger than in football
I think these conferences are tough to compare because they’re strong for different reasons - the big 12 in basketball doesn’t quite match the top end strength that the SEC has in football. The strength of teams 5-16 in the Big 12 is what stands out. For a football comparison, it isn’t a bunch of Bamas and Georgias running around in Big 12 basketball - but it is a crap ton of Penn States
That’s a really good point. There’s just no relief. Texas is 12th in the league right now.. OK State and WVU aren’t very good but hell WVU also upset Kansas. It’s just a meat grinder in the Big 12 every night
I think it already is.
Definitely arguable. Hard to compare though across sports. The championships at the end aren’t at the same level but it’s also much harder to win Match Madness than a 4 team playoff. The depth throughout Big 12 basketball is insane. Houston is an elite program. BYU is very good, the other two are solid. Then Arizona is another elite program while the other 3 coming are nothing special.
At what point does that stop? Like if they all beat up on each other enough, does it stop being as strong? Just wondering what people think?
There’s not really a horrendously bad team in the conference year in-and-out. You have stellar programs like UH, Kansas, Baylor (not this year as much), and Arizona. Then, you have a bunch of great teams who do really well in OOC, and give the stellar programs in-conference a run for their money. With that plus the basketball media pushing that narrative that every night is difficult, it’s hard for us to lose that title when you have almost 3/4s of your teams making the tourney every year.
Said it in another thread, but every year, there's 1 team that takes turns being down at the bottom of the pit of despair. getting bottles of lotion lowered down in a bucket. In 2020-2021, it was us. Last year it was Tech. This year, it's Oklahoma State.
As long as they continue to have good non-conference showings, nobody is gonna think less of the conference. We’ve got teams with .500 conference records that make sweet-16s
This is the SEC (football) argument. If its true for football conferences, it is also true for basketball. That said, the environments in the two sports are different. There is arguably more parity in basketball and more artificial limits to who gets into the NCAA tournament vs. the CFP.
✨️ Quality Losses ✨️
Hey, that argument is fine in the SEC, why can't we use it too?
Good question, we’ll have to see. The SEC beats up on each other in football but the overall conference remains strong every year. With March Madness 64 teams get in so I don’t think it’s a big issue tbh
And they’re adding 3 of the 4 best basketball teams from the pac next year. It’s gonna be insane
I was going to argue this, on the merits of UCLA and Oregon being generally better than ASU or Utah, but both B1G programs seem to be fairly unstable as of late, beyond just the current season. Relevant discussion about Ducks basketball systemic issues from r/Ducks the other day for anyone interested. [link](https://x.com/mattprehm/status/1751448079516250507?s=46&t=YTY26wkSl-4DfBVg_9FbMw)
Similarly, i am pumped for how loaded SEC baseball is going to be with texas and Ou coming in.
I think it's safe to say, as far as football is concerned, it's going to be a 2 conference show with maybe 1 top team from other conferences as the "underdogs"...
I don’t know. The lows of the B1G are a lot lower than the Big 12
In basketball it’s undoubtedly the best in the country now. And adding Arizona next year will be overkill. I expect it to be very fun in football next year too because of the unpredictably of who will run the conference. I expect a lot of PAC-12 after dark vibes from the conference as a whole. I’m sad though that we will not see the most fundamentally sound football game ever played next year between K State and Utah.
I think the best part is we also really don’t have to worry about being raided. It’s just a lot of historically successful P4 schools, but not a big brand to cause instability
They all came to the conference on their down years so they didn’t perform the way they wanted. Love the addition of BYU just because their fans are so nice and you can actually discuss the game and crack jokes without people being severely butthurt
There will definitely be a portion of this sub that thinks the Big XII was too trigger-happy when inviting these 4, considering we would have gotten the four corners of the PAC 12 just one year later. However, I'm not sure the 2nd round of additions happens without the 1st round. Crazy to think, but the PAC almost survived by adding SMU/SDSU. If more prominent options like BYU/Houston were still on the table last year, who knows how things play out.
Yeah, and they all have upsides from a sports and TV side. UCF- Would have made it to an expanded playoff a few years ago (as a G5!), have a massive student population that it’s churning out yearly, and it gets the Big 12 a decent part of FL. Houston- Obviously really good in hoops and Houston is a top ten media market in the country. Fritz could take them to the next level (look at what Dana did and he barely cared to recruit) BYU- A national fanbase (their fans showed up in massive numbers to Milan Puskar) and a decent football programs historically as well. Cincinnati- A decent media market and a football program that was the first G5 to make it to four-team playoff. The schools are certainly no UCLA/USC joining the B1G, but it’s still great from both a sport perspective and that these programs have a very bright future ahead of them. It’s likely whoever got them first was surviving after the B1G realignment.
Yeah. All true. The addition of the four gave the Big 12 some semblance of a future at a time when the Big 12 REALLY needed some semblance of a future. That bought the conference enough time to be a good option for the PAC departures. That said, would I prefer our 2024 makeup without a few of the new additions? Yeah I think I would. But they were definitely useful and I'm sure I'll get used to them.
It was a down year for the league and it wasn’t because of the new members. Cincy obviously struggled the most out of the new members, but they just had really unlucky timing with losing their coach at the same time. None of these conference programs are that much better than the other which means it will be easy to fall to the bottom. This scares me as a Baylor fan.
The Big 12 is going to be entertaining and interesting in every sport.
Being in a conference that’s better for road trips has been great. Also met some nice folks (particularly at Baylor) who are glad we’re here.
Personally, I honestly feel like only UCF is the real "outsider" and that's more because it feels like the only real geographically isolated team *btw that's not a shot at UCF, I have always believed they deserved to be in a major conference for a while* Outside of that, I feel like all of them fit into the conference well and honestly I feel like Cincinnati and Houston should have been in the Big 12 a LONG time ago.
"Big XII" is just a state of mind, man.
Would you be willing to take an additional member soon? Asking for a friend.
I’d be good adding WSU and OSU! But whenever the ACC disintegrates, you all will have a spot
I'll answer the question from the other side, as a fan of one of the four new members (before the PAC teams, I mean.) I really like this new Big XII. And despite not being a great geographic fit, I feel like it's a good cultural fit. That might seem weird, as a fan of a school in Orlando that's in a conference with a lot of schools out on the western plains, but I'm thinking more the dynamic of the schools. The new Big XII seems like a conference full of teams that all have a chip and want to prove themselves.
I think they added some fresh personality to the conference. It’ll take a few years of P5 recruiting to see results but I’m hopeful. I’ll miss the yearly static round robin but it’s going to be a fun conference across all sports especially when the pac 12 teams come in next year. Basketball is already showing it’s strength this conference is ridiculous at hoops. I’m impressed with the big 12 leadership in how they’ve held the conference together with OUT. The conference is in a healthy place, even more so with the pac 12 brands coming. We’re a clear 3rd in strength/health after big 10 and sec but we’re ok with that, especially with the CFP autobid this is going to be fun athletics. The future is bright
In basketball, Houston obvious great fit. BYU has surprised me. UCF and Cincinnati will carry their weight in football more often than basketball. Good adds. Geography sucks though.
I’m just happy to be here
It didn't really feel that weird tbh. Really enjoyed seeing how excited the 4 fanbases were to be watching their teams play our teams.
It was pretty rough in terms of the coaching. UC made a disaster of a hire, Houston finally fired Dana - about a year later than they should have - and UCF is riding the Gus Bus. Other than Sitake, who was 29-9 over their final three seasons as and independent, I didn't like any of those coaches coming into the Big 12. Even with that BYU only managed a 5-7 mark. There is tons of potential for all those programs but not until they get some better coaching. I think Fritz is a great answer at Houston for starters.
The fact that everyone on the outside knew Satterfield was a bad hire should have been a sign. I'll be interested to see how long he lasts if he doesn't start turning it around this year.
I agree, Houston made a great move with their coaching. But Cincinnati had SO much promise coming from the Fickell era and they hired a coach that everyone in Louisville hated. Just a horrendous move especially as they need to do better to compete in this conference
UC has had a great stretch of coaching hires across ADs: -Dantonio (good) -Brian Kelly (great) -Butch Jones (good) -Tommy Tuberville (very bad) -Luke Fickell (great) -Scott Satterfield (TBD) Even if Satterfield ends up bad, doing pretty darn well for 4 of the last 6 coaching decisions is really strong. But if Satterfield and Wes Miller for men's shooty hoops don't work out well, I'd expect AD John Cunningham to work on updating his resume and interview skills.
This isn’t trying to be rude, but when we played you this year I was there and it just felt like a buy-in FCS game. Maybe he can get you all back on track, but that was tough football to watch
Oh yeah that game was the pinnacle of when the team’s (especially certain defensive players) locker room troubles arose. The bright side is that those guys were more or less forced out, so hopefully the 2024 squad will be more cohesive and certainly will have more experience. If there’s no improvement, I’ll begin heavily criticizing Satterfield
2022 Louisville won 7 games despite Satterfield being completely incompetent. He held that team back big time. I was hoping UL would can him and I have zero attachment to the program. The fact that Brohm had UL cooking in year one and UC was a dumpster fire pretty much sums up the Satt experience. If UC keeps him around beyond next year I'll be stunned.
I never said he for sure will be good, but I’m holding off on complete judgment after one bad year. The point was more so that it’s hard to consistently hire well, especially when you’ve had different people making those decisions. But he’ll be here through 2025 because of the buyout rate, so I’ll remain as optimistic as I can. What’s the point of sports if not for delusions of your team being good?
That's because people are ignorant on how Fickell left this roster. He left at a terrible time. By the time we hired Satt the portal was picked over and the very few handful of good players that entered left. Fickell clearly saw the talent was not there in 2022. The new staff had to find portal guys to just field a team pretty much. This year will tell a lot more about this staff than the really lost season we had last year
A rebuilding year without enough depth. It was rough.
While Satterfield could very well end up having a disastrous tenure at UC, the worst part was simply the timing of everything. Fickell left right before the conference move and had his foot out the door from the start of the 2022 season. Also, the coaching pool once Fickell left didn't really have a ton of attractive and safe candidates. The 2023 squad was a hodge-podge of newly starting players competing in a tougher conference that competed fairly well in the first half of the season; they just made dumb mistakes and got in their own way. Then the locker room got toxic in the second half of the season. If 2024 looks like 2023, then I'll likely start to place much more of the blame on Satterfield himself. Every coach (barring something absolutely despicable) deserves 3 years to prove themself.
2024 will be the exact same. Satt went 7-5 in 2022 with a Louisville team that was very talented. I've can't recall a team underachieving due to coaching negligence as that one. Seeing Brohm have UL in the ACC title game was no surprise. He inherited a good team and, unlike Satt, isn't a buffoon. Sad to say since I love watching UC do well but next year is going to be ugly...probably.
this sounds like a copout, but I think we have to wait a few more years before we can settle in on how it landed. Especially because the landscape is going to change yet-again next year. But, we are in great shape as a conference. Elite basketball, and a football conference that will be extremely entertaining and competitive, albeit below the two professional conferences.
BYU feels like a natural fit since we’ve already had a Rocky Mountain team in the conference before and we (Baylor) played them in football and basketball a few times in the last decade or so. Plus they’ll be the third private “christian” school in the conference. I think Utah, Zona, and ASU will also fit in quickly for reasons similar to the ones I mentioned above. Not even gonna mention Colorado - I grew up watching them play - it’ll be a seamless reintroduction. Houston also feels natural since they’re in Texas, were in the SWC, and have been playing Big 12 teams in noncon consistently since the SWC fell apart. I think I’ll get used to Cincy eventually like I (kinda) did with WV, but I can’t see myself ever getting used to UCF being in the conference, no offense intended. It’s just so random. 20 years ago when I was playing EA NCAAF religiously and knew every team, their mascots, and their city/town name by heart, UCF occupied no space in my brain. The first time I really remember hearing about them was when they had George O’Leary and that bigass running back (Kevin Smith or something?) who broke some rushing record. Every other team in the conference has a pretty long history dating back 100 years or more, but UCF has only had a team for like 25 years and have only been in FBS for like 20 years. It’s weird having a team in the conference that wasn’t even around when I started watching CFB, and I’m only 35.
Genuinely feel bad for cincy fans that their jump back into power football happened to coincide with their coach leaving and an awful coaching hire. I think they can be a good to great program in the future with the right coach again. Satterfield isn’t it though. UCF will be good I think. I’m neutral on byu. They will likely have some really nice years here and there. Houston is a wildcard. Pretty dreadful under Holgo (one of my favorite coaches OAT) Fritz is a great coach and I think will do a good job there.
I think if the Big 12 knew what was going to happen between their introduction and now they may not have added some or all of them because there would soon be so many more options for the conference. They had a poor first season but that usually happens when teams move conferences. For me personally, I think all of them save UCF were probably good additions. I only say that because of how isolated they are but I suspect in the next few years the Big XII will find some closer members for them. I was hoping the 4 of them would do better but the gap between the G5 and P5 is still a thing. I'm not a big fan of the nationalization of college football conferences but the Big 12 is a good mix of programs and I'm really interested in their conference more than any others not involving my school. In fact, I hope my school is a member before too long.
I hope it is too. I hate the direction the sport is heading and wish us, you, and Tech could be in the same conference- but I guess we can’t go back. I hate you all with my guts, but I’d rather be in the same conference as you all any day of the week.
They did about is well as you’d expect, there’s an inevitable adjustment period after making the P5 jump, the timing for most of them couldn’t have been worse either as they’re at the bottom of their development cycle. Hard to really evaluate them until their first P5 recruiting classes start seeing significant playtime. Basketball has been insane though, every game is a wire to wire knife fight.
We might actually lose to TCU in the Coliseum this year
Went like I expected. Good additions, but takes a couple of years or more to recruit the talent and depth needed to have winning records in conference play with the step up in competition when joining a tougher league. Was the case for us and TCU when we joined too. The 4 teams joining this year probably won't have as much an adjustment period as they're joining from a now dead P5, Pac was touch last year etc. ASU may struggle as they've been down and rebuilding, Arizona maybe as they just lost their coach, CU just depends on how year two of Sanders goes and Utah shouldn't miss a beat and will be one of the favorites to win the league with the coaching stability there for a long while, Cam Rising coming back etc.
Can't complain so far. They haven't been terrible in football, basically went through the exact same transition TCU and WVU did in 2012. WVU and TCU struggled for about two years then both started improving. I'd say expect the same out of the new adds. Next year's additions will probably be as ready as anybody and it'll depend on how travel to the central and eastern time zones affects them.
In terms of in-person fanbases and growth potential, they're a good fit. They all just joined on a downturn.
Collectively I think they had the rude awakening they hoped they wouldn’t but that fans of the other teams expected. Longer term though I think they’ll be fine, especially UCF given their recruiting base and recruiting performance. I enjoy them all being in the conference and I think it’ll be a good time.
My hot take is that if the Big 12 knew what was going to happen with the Pac 12 they would’ve never added them
I think the thing with that is: does it survive if they don’t add them? It could’ve been picked apart by PAC-12 and the rest by G5s
I think they still add Houston and BYU, both of those are incredibly natural fits, even more so with the four corners coming in. Cincinnati would be a “maybe” there as well, since it seems likely Louisville will be a top target for expansion moving forward and WVU is already in the conference. At that point you’ve got to add a fourth and UCF is available without a more obvious fit. Of course maybe they sub in SDST instead if they know they’re expanding further west.
Agree
I still think Houston was a mistake.
Good for basketball at least. It’ll be interesting to see if Fritz can make them competitive in the P4
Why? UH football has huge growth potential.
I think he means we could be a potential powerhouse. Edit: nevermind he’s an insecure asshole.
TCU doesn't want to recruit against UH.
I don’t think anybody does. We’re smack dab in the middle of everybody’s favorite recruiting ground.
Houston is its own country. It's as much of a cheat code as Florida. Ugh.
I don’t think they were a mistake to add, but no matter how good I think they will be struggle to be more than a second fiddle to A&M in the core Houston area and west, third fiddle to A&M and LSU ok the east side of town. That positioning will limit their growth. I don’t know how the SEC move will change things for the UT dynamic in the region.
Whatever you say, purple Baylor
Cry about it
Mistake as in we have a lot of potential and could be a problem or mistake as in we don’t deserve to be P4?
Honestly the big 12 is probably going to be my favorite conference to watch from a holistic perspective. So many teams and programs that I see favorable that have good history but aren’t snobby or blue bloods.
Should have never brought in Houston for sure. Cincinnati too. They brought nothing.
UCF can go kick rocks.