Why Big Ten, SEC football will probably expand, start their own league
By Ryan Kay
The possible move will not happen in a year or two — or even four
There are some hurdles before, at minimum, the SEC and Big Ten could expand to 20 or more schools and leave the NCAA. The first hurdle is the ACC and their media rights deal with ESPN that goes all the way through the year 2035.
It is argued that it would take six ACC schools to leave to make it financially worth it to have lawyers fight for the schools to leave the ACC for the Big Ten and or SEC. The ACC will make the litigious process difficult and demand a large amount of money per school via exit fees for each of the schools that leave the conference for the Big Ten or SEC. Both conferences need schools from the ACC in order to fully expand to financially make it worth it for them to leave the NCAA.
State legislatures and school board regents can make expansion difficult for the Big Ten and SEC. A recent example is UCLA, where the University of California Board of Regents are discussing possible ways to prevent the Bruins from leaving the Pac-12 for the Big Ten. Even though many believe the board of regents will eventually let UCLA go to the Big Ten, it still foreshadows the possibilities of further schools leaving for either the Big Ten or SEC having to deal with pushback from school board regents or state legislatures.
State legislatures, for example in the state of Washington, may make it difficult for the University of Washington to leave the Pac-12 without Washington State. The Huskies would be able to leave for the Big Ten but the state legislature can slow the process if they are motivated enough to do so.
What if the ACC and Pac-12 merge forcing a new media rights deal to get the members of their conferences more money? There have been rumors of what a merger of the two conferences would look like. However, even if they were to combine and form one conference, it would only slow college football expansion and not stop the Big Ten and SEC from taking some of their most valuable members.
The Big Ten more than likely will target at least two schools from the Pac-12 to pair with UCLA and USC and the SEC has been rumored that they want to add Clemson and Florida State from the ACC. No matter what the Pac-12 and ACC do, it is very likely that the Big Ten and SEC will eventually add teams from those two conferences to theirs.