Texas and oklahoma join the sec
Two of the Big12's best teams will be heading to new pastures in 2025
Oklahoma, a team that has won six straight conference championships. Texas, a team that has had its ups and downs but has always been a contender in the Big12. Now, it's all about to change. Oklahoma and Texas have just been voted into the SEC, with the transition to occur in 2025 when their Big12 contract ends.
The impact this is going to have on the rest of college football will be extraordinary. Let’s dig a little deeper into the x’s and o’s of why these teams have decided to join the SEC and the potential outcome.
Texas joined the SEC for a couple of reasons. Texas wants money, as do most teams in college football. Texas earned roughly $34 million last season and moving to the SEC would greatly increase that number- potentially to north of $60 million. They also want the opportunity to play in that old heated rivalry against Texas A&M after seeing what the Aggies were able to accomplish in the 2021 season.
Meanwhile, Oklahoma’s reasons for entering the SEC are slightly different. Oklahoma has always been a powerhouse team in the Big12, and they really haven’t had much trouble winning games within that conference. Moving to the SEC would make their schedule much tougher. Oklahoma is looking for a challenge, and they know that they can win these tougher games against teams like Alabama, considering that they have made the college football playoff for four of the last six years.
Both Texas and Oklahoma will benefit heavily from a recruiting standpoint. Oklahoma and Texas already recruited at a decent level, but now their recruiting is going to be even better. In the past years Texas has taken a step down and Texas A&M has only gotten better. This resulted in Texas A&M stealing some of the top recruits out of Texas, but now that Texas is going to get to play Texas A&M on a regular basis, that may change. Oklahoma’s recruiting will simply be better because of the fact that they will get more chances to beat teams like Alabama and Georgia. This may really have a big effect on the rest of college football.
Oklahoma and Texas stand to gain a lot from this move. But the Big12, on the other hand, is kind of in a pickle. With their two biggest brands’ departure, the Big12 will contain only eight teams, making it the smallest power five conference. Not to mention the fact that almost half of the money the Big12 makes comes from Texas and Oklahoma. That being said, they do have a couple of other options. They can try to get the big group of five schools such as Houston, Memphis, or UCF, or the remaining teams can leave the Big12 and go join other conferences.
It's obvious that the move will have a huge effect on the teams and on the SEC. But what's less obvious is the potential effect on the other power five conferences. If the Big12’s remaining teams left to go join the ACC, Big10, or Pac12, then we would be talking about conference realignment throughout all of college football. It would be a completely different CFB world. We could go from five major conferences to four bigger conferences. Just imagine if constant top-25 teams like Iowa State and Oklahoma St were in the ACC or Pac-12. In fact, the Big10, ACC, and Pac12 have recently been discussing a scheduling alliance so they can try to compete with the soon-to-be 16 team mega conference in the SEC. Even with all of this hype about the Big12 breaking up, keep in mind that as of now, nothing is certain.
Everybody knows that Texas and Oklahoma joining the SEC is going to start major change in college football. We already know that there are going to be changes to recruiting and conference realignment within the SEC, but there are still so many unanswered questions. Conference realignment, teams joining new conferences, conferences going away… The 2025 season is sure to be an interesting one.
This is Brady’s first year on staff and his first year at Edgewood. He loves fishing, roller coasters, and sports. He hopes his enthusiasm for sports will inspire other people to love them as well.