The Calm Before the Mayhem

The seismic shift in major college conference alignment is about to go down, and like the final episode of the Sopranos, the action is going to peel everybody's eyelids back.

Forget the "where will Notre Dame go" questions, or the relatively tame "could the Big Ten raid a few schools from the ACC" drama.

The PAC-10 has just been given the green light to wipe out the Big 12 South.

The Pac-10 administrators arrived in San Francisco this weekend to a report that the conference was ready to invite Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and Baylor from the Big 12 to create a 16-team megaconference.

There has also been a report that Baylor could replace Colorado in that scenario or the Pac-10 could choose to keep the status quo or add only two teams in a smaller move.

Hol-lee sheeet!

I can imagine how this conversation went down.

PAC-10 UNDERLINGS: "So, uh, boss, should we send out the expansion invites? Maybe Utah, and BYU to start?"

PAC-10 BOSSES: "Go to twelve? Fuck that. Let's do 16, bitches. If Gillette can cram 5 razor blades into a single handle, we can do 16."

UNDERLINGS: (squeeky voice): "Ummmmm.... I don't know where we are going to find 6 teams, boss."

BOSSES: "Here. Take the Big 12 South. I count 6 teams there, and all we really want is Texas. We can throw away Baylor later, like a free eyeglass case."

Personally, I like the Big 12 as it stands. It's wide open outdoor Arena Football. Always fun to bet the "over" and not quite as pretentious as the southern blowhards in the SEC.

And the Pac-10 has decided they might just pull their boat up along side it, board the sucker, and saw the thing in half and let it sink?

My gawd.

On the flip side, it does give Mac Brown a whole new set of conference rivals to choke against. Ditto Bob Stoops.