The Colorado Buffaloes are going to leave the Pacific-12 Conference to go back to the Big XII Conference next year, and that means the clock is ticking for the demise of the Conference of (real NCAA) Champions. It will be down to 11 teams for the 2024-2025 academic year, and without a TV contract in place, it makes sense for the B1G to do what we have suggested in the past: poach Cal, Oregon, Stanford, and Washington.

This is all due to the greed of football revenues, as the Pac-12 is the pre-eminent conference—and always has been—for collecting NCAA titles in all sports. But starting with the corruption of the Southeastern Conference decades ago, everything became focused on TV dollars. When the B1G decided to lure away UCLA and USC, it just fed into the problem that will never go away until the NFL is forced to do something.

So, for the four schools listed above, it’s time to make the move if the B1G won’t: there are no “valuable” schools left to grab to replace Colorado, UCLA, and USC. Even San Diego State would not be a viable option at this point; it would just be a stopgap of sorts. The Pac-12 will collapse soon, or it will end up merging with a lesser entity (does the Mountain West count?) in order to maintain some sort of sanity on the Best Coast.

It’s okay if the Pac-12 goes away, as its own traditions really don’t extend that far back in time. It’s about survival now for the proud(er) institutions who remain and their sports teams: the Golden Bears, the Ducks, the Cardinal, and the Huskies. Eventually, Utah and the Arizona schools probably will go to the Big XII, as well, so it’s better to be proactive from both the B1G’s point of view—and the perspective of these four.