Texas is one of the most well funded and competitively advantaged athletic departments in the country. Texas has an unbelievable amount of arrogance and resources, and I can assuredly state they were not worried about being ready. Sure, they have underperformed recently, but it's no different than every other school that goes through periods of ups and downs. Look at how Tennessee, Florida, Alabama, and Auburn have fluctuated the past 30 years. Texas will be just fine, and they are positioning themselves for the future. Admittedly, Texas leaving the B12 does indicate they are willing to give up a ton of control for a more secured future, as they can't run the SEC as if it is their own conference. UNC is in a similar position, meaning if they join the Big10 or SEC they will do just fine, but they won't be the "flagship" university in the conference anymore. Disregarding GOR issues, if UNC joined the SEC, similarly to Va Tech or UVA joining... each school would likely see a big financial windfall and a pickup in recruiting.

they haven’t been winning them or making the playoff with already great recruiting classes. The new competition is going to be far harder, and they have way underperformed in a much easier competition. As they say, be careful what you hope for, because you just might get it.

You could make that same argument against almost every other team. In reality, there are about 20 college football brands that could return to dominance. Any team with ample resources just needs the right chemistry, coach, and a bit of luck. According to your premise, Florida will never be great again. Florida State will never be great again. USC will never be great again. Penn State will never be great again. Tennessee will never be great again. Michigan State will never be solid. How did Georgia ever become great since they had a long period of not being great. How did ND ever make the playoffs continuously as they program struggled for a decade. You can't accurately forecast next year's weather based on looking at the weather the past few years.

A school first needs a great coaching hire. These days they also need good Offensive & Defensive Coordinators. Pinching pennies cannot be an issue in holding those coaches once they are hired. They will each want millions in raises as levels of success are reached. Failure to pay those raises will likely cause them to move on to better financial offers from a program's competitive rivals. Great facilities are the next recruiting enticements that will cost millions. An 80,000 seat football stadium is the gold standard in the SEC. Along with Triple A type baseball stadiums and 20,000 seat basketball arenas. Arkansas has a top flight track facility built by a donation from Tyson. Walmart paid half the cost of the basketball arena built during the Nolan Richardson basketball era. Even a top flight basketball practice arena is necessary these days to lure top flight basketball recruits. All these things are absolutely necessary to recruit at a top level in the SEC in football, basketball, baseball & track. Not all schools in the SEC has these luxury type facilities. I know Missouri and the Mississippi schools are very lacking. However they will pay the prices on coaches. Kentucky puts the big bucks in basketball and Vandy is not on a par with most of the schools in the SEC facility wise. Those schools have their bars raised for competing in the SEC by not paying the millions necessary for luxury facilities. I noticed a post here that said Virginia Tech would join the likes of Kentucky & Missouri in the SEC. The actual question is how much money will Virginia Tech spend to win in the SEC?

feel that way at all. My premise is that Texas has struggled for over a decade in the Big 12, and they are going to a much better Conference. So while the money will roll in, they have a lot to prove on the wins rolling in. That other stuff I never said it.

They've done less with more than any other athletic department in the country in the past 15 years.

I use to spend a lot of time on big sports boards that no longer exist. One was a big all conference Scout board. I was about as much at home on the Big 12 board as the SEC board. Got along fine with the Texas posters but had to rough it out with Oklahoma Sooner folks. Just cannot jive with them over the long haul. They will eventually troll the Hogs even though the football meetings have been very scarce over the years. Anyway those Texans in unison told me the Longhorn football problems were due to whales deciding schollies and sometimes who played. I later saw a big spat of that within the Razorback program when Arkansas was wallowing in the SEC football cellar for seven years. It will destroy a program. It hurts team morale and kills motivation. ** Edited by WarHog38 at 8/13/2022, 10:20:52 PM

Easy to get along on a Hokie board.

Campus. Actually one of the few that compares to Blacksburg in my opinion. There was nothing 2nd rate about the facilities there.

ready for the Big 12 in years so I would call it more of a certainty than a rumor.;-) The train wreck in Austin will be epic if Arch turns out to be a 5-star in name only. They're likely to have to airlift Sark to rehab again directly from the sidelines.

Texas will be even worse. Good Luck to Oklahoma. Now they will be going into the buzz saw of schools with no academic inhibitions that are now licensed to cheat. They were doing it before under the table. Mike Slive convinced them to stop turning each other in. But now, they have free license. No. UNC and UVA have no interest.

I hear JB Hunt is the big whale helping Arkansas. Texas A&M did beat Alabama in College Station last season. I don't know how NIL will be regulated but regulation of some type is probably coming. I think references about Slive are correct but in the sense that the SEC Front Office just became a lot bigger than the NCAA. I think SEC officiating tends to favor the more proven winning programs. That has a direct relation to where the big money is at in the post season. Simply put, the better a program gets, the better SEC officiating will get on their behalf. I have seen this over the years with Arkansas. Arkansas has real good years with Top 5 teams right after Danny Ford was fired. Houston Nutt used Ford's players just as Nutt used Ed Orgeron's players at Ole Miss. Arkansas was also good the last two years with Bobby Petrino before his motorcycle crash with his volley ball girlfriend. Those teams were not axed by SEC officiating except one game at Auburn with Cam Newton. A school in the SEC just has to get good. That is done by hiring a real good coach.

and on, and onnnnn!!!!! :-)

Everyone knew it, but Mike Slive stopped them all from pointing it out. He was the one who pulled that conference together IMO. It was something to actually admire about Mike Slive. We'll see where it goes from here.

you’ve got free agency with no rules on compensation. It’s like AFL v NFL, stashing players in hotels in 1965.

Hoo grad, lives in SF, her two kids went to Auburn and she travels to auburn games a lot. She said, “Uva would be destroyed in the SEC” ….They know

Last 2 games was UVA 28 South Carolina 0 and Florida 36 UVA 28. Florida was ranked #6 at the time, and had to make a late end zone interception to avoid a potential tying 2pt conversion attempt. Last 2 games was UVA 28 South Carolina 0 and Florida 36 UVA 28. Florida was ranked #6 at the time, and had to make a late end zone interception to avoid a potential tying 2pt conversion attempt. Last UVA game in Jordan-Hare Stadium in Auburn, Alabama was UVA 19 Auburn 0. South Carolina is the last one to actually agree to come to Scott Stadium with a UVA 34 USC 21 final. SEC teams won't schedule home-home games much because they don't want to play the road games. We have to play them at so called neutral sites in the South. We have a so called neutral site game in Nashville against Tennessee coming up. Last time UVA played them Tennessee kicked a field goal in the last minute of the 4th quarter to win by 2 in the Sugar Bowl. We'll see how it goes in 2023. I was at the last VT-Tennessee game at the Bristol Speedway. It was a fun party tailgating out there. I went with a VT friend. I would just ask the UVA friend what she means by destroyed. Yes UVA would have a hard time winning the SEC in football. We're not exactly winning the ACC as it is. But UVA would have no fear in basketball, baseball, tennis, golf, or other sports. It's just that the SEC doesn't participate in many sports. I have zero interest in the SEC. We play them enough in NCAA tournaments. UVA wins most of the time. Just a few months ago in the NCAA Men's Tennis Tournament it was UVA 4 South Carolina 0, UVA 4 Florida 1, UVA 5 Tennessee 0, and UVA 4 Kentucky 0 for the Championship. UVA took out Auburn in the men's basketball semifinal in 2019. It is getting somewhat tedious playing them because UVA wins most of the time. Mississippi State did beat UVA the last time UVA was in the baseball college world series due to a 9th inning pitching breakdown by the UVA pitcher. MSU won the national championship after that. So it doe happen that UVA gets beat.

UVA and VT will be fine. I have no doubt in time that both football programs would rise to the occasion. It would be a good kick in the butt for both programs.

We wouldn't become an Alabama, LSU or UGA.

To be fair, VT would too.

I'm just not a fan of the SEC or the Big Ten. UVA going to either one won't change that. I was recently in Annapolis last fall, and it hasn't changed most Maryland fans either. They told me they'd rather still be in the ACC than playing Michigan. I would feel the exact same way. So I'd like to look for solutions to keep the ACC going strong.

UNC is a better fit for the B1G too, but their roots are more southern and John Skipper no doubt wants them there if the ACC breaks up. All this is a big if on the ACC breaking up, with the GOR and the potential for basketball to break off like football.

pay Nebraska the difference from their cut to leave the B1G for B12 Merge B12 with Pac 10 and Texas would create third power conference with their brand, B12, Pac 12 That ssounds like Texas thinking. Not sure they can pull it off. ** Edited by LocalExperts at 8/13/2022, 1:01:40 PM

Texas A&M, Arkansas, Oklahoma, and LSU can become one. I'm not shocked that Texas went to the SEC. They have no real relationship with anyone in the ACC or Big Ten. The USC/UCLA to the Big Ten is more shocking, but it is clearly motivated by Fox Sports.

Texas had seven rivals within Texas in the old SWC. I remember they hated Houston even more than the Aggies or Hogs. Texas fans use to all say that the Aggies were a bigger rival to them over the Razorbacks. You can kinda look at the old SWC to see what may be the future for the Pac and perhaps even the ACC. Oddly enough I think the Big 12 may have benefited by being the first P5 conference to be severely blundered. They had a chance to reboot so to speak. I think the centralized geographic position probably helped some too. Although the book is far from being totally written on all of that. Back to the old SWC. Arkansas left a conference virtually riddled by low attendances and NCAA recruiting investigations & accompanying heavy sanctions. Plus embarrassing showings over & over in outer conference football match-ups. About five years later, with Texas calling all the shots along with the Texas governor, Ann Richards, Texas took Texas A&M, Texas Tech & Baylor. To merge with the Big Eight to form the Big 12. Baylor got the nod over TCU, SMU, Houston & Rice because Ann Richards was a Baylor Alumni. Frank Broyles had predicted that SWC break-up and said Texas would call the shot and not take care of Arkansas. That would have played out to be so true. You then look at what happened to TCU, SMU, Houston & Rice, they were all flung to the far corners of multiple G5 conferences. TCU and Houston did maintain programs that over those decades have brought them up to the Big 12 level of which they were once rejected in 1995. However SMU & Rice are probably doomed to G5 forevermore. They were both football powerhouses in the 1930's & 1940's. Is that the future for possible Pac & ACC left-overs. Likely so.

I don't believe that they see any in the ACC. When the SWC broke up it was not a pretty site. I definitely don't want that in the ACC. SMU got ranked recently in the top 25 in football, so they have potential to improve. Not sure about Rice. I do think that Texas remembers its rivalry with Arkansas, and they will see that game as familiar although it's been about 30 years. I actually wouldn't mind seeing SMU here in the ACC. But we have no history with SMU. WVU and Cincinnati yes. That's why I recommend them instead. They are within our proximity geographically, and we do have history with both of them.

I do think a conference does have to get aggressive these days to literally survive. Passivity is a real conference killer. That old world of 8-10 team college football conferences and lots of independents with nobody looking over the fence is gone literally & long gone mentally as well. It is all about grabbing for dollars these days all across this country's economic structure.

it makes no sense and 30 years ago that statement was laughable - now it's the sad reality

ACC and have Notre Dame finally join the ACC. I heard it other places too, but the A&M folks were the more adamant about it, while others were saying it was entirely possible, but not adamant. That’s before the ESPN Fox war started and both seem to change their strategy from a Power 4, to a Power 2. I know it seems like a long shot, but the two best basketball Conferences are the ACC 1 and B12. If basketball breaks off from the NCAA, those two Conferences could start making big money in basketball. If so, we are back to a Power 4.

Just sayin'