Cincinnati’s president has been campaigning for Big 12 move
Cincinnati is interested in switching conferences.
According to documents obtained by the Cincinnati Enquirer, emails show that the president of the school has been in contact with others about the possibility of the Bearcats joining the Big 12 since 2014. Cincy is currently a member of the American Athletic Conference.
The Big 12 is currently at 10 teams. While it’s possible the league could expand at some point, there’s no immediate incentive for it to do so. The league is now allowed to host a conference championship game after a rule mandating that conferences must have 12 teams to have a title game was ditched.
Per the communications revealed by the Enquirer, president Santa Ono talked to former Kansas State president John Wefald, who told Ono that if Cincinnati wanted to get to the Big 12, it may have to make a short term revenue cut and that Oklahoma president David Boren liked UC as an expansion candidate. Boren has been outspoken about his thoughts on the Big 12 expanding back to 12 teams.
In a Jan. 26, 2015, message to Ono, Wefald said he had talked to several key Big 12 leaders, mentioning Boren and then-Texas President Bill Powers.
“David is impressed with Cincinnati,” Wefald told Ono. “He knows that UC is a big-time school. … Now, I did not talk to him about the revenues that each school gets. I doubt that he would be enthused about any kind of a ‘major haircut.’”
Later in the email, Wefald said: “The only way I see to get Cincinnati into the Big 12 is this: that UC and the 2nd school would have to volunteer to take the financial haircut yourselves. Why? Because the three major networks will never add enough monies to allow the next two schools to have the same revenues as the 10 to (sic) now.”
Wefald continued: “The emphasis of UC right now should be this: Get into the Big 12 and worry about equal revenues later. So get in now and tell the other 10 universities that you and the second school will take the haircut.”
The school had previously refused to released communications and documents possibly pertaining to Big 12 expansion. That refusal was before the Big 12’s February meetings, however. The Big 12 didn’t talk in specifics about expansion at the meetings and decided that commissioner Bob Bowlsby would be the league’s spokesperson when it came to expansion matters, silencing Boren and others on the issue.
Ono told the paper that “I am indeed optimistic that through these efforts the University of Cincinnati is positioned exceptionally well to continue to compete at the highest level.”
Cincinnati would be a geographical fit for the Big 12 because the conference has no one located between Iowa State and West Virginia. The Bearcats would bring new television markets into play for the Big 12, though deciphering who a 12th team could be for the conference is a dicier proposition. If the Big 12 gets back to 12 and wants to go back to North and South divisions (without separating Oklahoma and Oklahoma State), a team north of Texas and Oklahoma may be necessary to join with Cincinnati.
– – – – – – –
Nick Bromberg is the assistant editor of Dr. Saturday on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
