ATLANTA, Ga. — While the college football world celebrates the start of a new season starting Saturday, long-time fans will look at this season with not only hope for their team but also sadness at what the game loses after this season.
Power 5 Conference Re-Alignment
Texas and Oklahoma, both fixtures in the Big XII Conference, will leave to join the powerhouse Southeastern Conference. Losing the Longhorns and Sooners to the SEC put a huge damper on the Big XII as it fought to remain in the conversation of Power 5 Conferences.
The Big 12 (16 teams in 2024) didn't rest on its collective laurels though. The conference added BYU, Cincinnati, Houston, and Central Florida for the 2023 season and will welcome Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado, and Utah in 2024 from the Pac-12 Conference.
The Big Ten will fortify its status as a power conference when it adds Oregon, UCLA, USC, and Washington to the conference. All four teams will leave the Pac-12 for the Big Ten (which will actually have 18 teams in 2024).
Pac-12 Conference
It's hard to believe, but the legendary Pac-12 Conference will essentially cease to exist starting in 2024. Only four teams will be left in the conference: California, Oregon State, Stanford, and Washington State. Some of those teams have tried to join other conferences to no avail thus far in 2023. The remaining teams could try to partner with a non-Power 5 Conference or stay independent.
However, the long and storied history of the Pac-12 essentially ends when the curtain falls on the 2023 season.
Rivalries
With so much realignment starting next season, some of the most storied games in college football history may not be played anymore due to conference games and television contracts.
Oklahoma has played Oklahoma State for decades in a game nicknamed "Bedlam." With the teams in rival conferences, keeping that game on the schedule may prove to be too much.
In the Pacific Northwest, Washington has played Washington State in the Apple Cup, but it may suffer the same fate as Bedlam. Staying in the region, Oregon and Oregon State have played the Civil War, but it may end in 2024.
The late-night Pac-12 games will be gone alongside the conference, robbing fans of watching Stanford or Oregon State stage late-night upsets of a top-ranked USC team.
SEC on CBS
Having grown up in the deep south, this writer had to mention this. The SEC will move off CBS starting in 2024 and be exclusively on ESPN. The SEC, the crown jewel of college football, went with ESPN and a bigger payday. But that move ends a long relationship with CBS that saw some of the greatest games in the SEC over the last decade of dominance played at 3:30 p.m.
Still, football fans can take solace in the big games that are still coming in 2023, including:
Florida State vs. LSU, Texas at Alabama, South Carolina at Georgia, Ohio State at Notre Dame, Georgia at Auburn, Alabama at Texas A&M, USC at Notre Dame, Tennessee at Alabama, LSU at Alabama, LSU at Alabama, Georgia at Tennessee, and Ohio State at Michigan.
That slate of games starting Sept. 3 will all be must-see TV for college football fans in 2023.
