Getty Image / Jacob Snow
Throughout this summer, the Pac-12 has been struggling to find themselves a new media rights deal.
That struggle has caused the conference some major problems this summer.
The conference had a chance to add San Diego State, who was coming off of a national title game appearance in basketball, after the Aztecs told the Mountain West they were going to leave.
The Aztecs would have helped the conference recover from the fact that they’re losing USC and UCLA next year.
Unfortunately, it fell through because of the uncertainty with their media deal.
Now their problems have gotten a whole lot bigger.
According to ESPN’s Pete Thamel and Heather Dinich, Colorado’s Board of Regents voted unanimously to leave the Pac-12 for the Big 12 after the 2023-24 season.
Breaking: The University of Colorado's Board of Regents voted unanimously to leave the Pac-12 for the Big 12 after the 2023-24 season.
More: https://t.co/JeqPKeMDSX pic.twitter.com/sAGgpfROf3
— ESPN (@espn) July 27, 2023
Colorado getting ready to bail could be a sign of things to come for other teams around the conference.
There have already been rumors about Utah, Arizona State, and Arizona also heading to the Big 12 and Oregon and Washington have previously been linked to the Big Ten.
Colorado is an interesting fit for the Big 12 right now. They have been an above-average basketball program for a while, but there football program has been pretty bad for a while.
However, it’s now a program that should get a lot of attention thanks to the arrival of Deion Sanders.
He has made some major changes to the program in an effort to try and make them competitive. It remains to be seen how those changes will work out, but he’ll probably need to make some more big moves to become a competitive team in the Big 12.
Colorado could be a solid pickup for the conference if Deion Sanders is able to turn them into a consistently good football program.
Even if he can’t, it’s a tough loss for the Pac-12.