Big 12 officially welcomes Arizona, Arizona State and Utah to the conference

After rumors and reports swirled, it’s now official. Arizona, Arizona State and Utah are heading to the Big 12, the conference announced on Friday night.

The league put out a press release announcing the additions on Friday.

“The Big 12 Board of Directors has voted unanimously to admit Arizona State University, University of Arizona, and University of Utah to the Big 12 Conference,” the statement read.

“We are thrilled to welcome Arizona, Arizona State and Utah to the Big 12. The conference is gaining three premier institutions both academically and athletically, and the entire Big 12 looks forward to working alongside their presidents, athletic directors, student-athletes and administrators.”

The Wildcats have been one of the most talked about teams on the conference realignment front since Colorado announced its plans to leave the Pac-12 for the Big 12. On3’s Eric Prisbell reported commissioner Brett Yormark’s interest in bringing Arizona on board as the 14th team for the league, which is preparing to lose Oklahoma and Texas to the SEC.

But the Sun Devils are also making their way to the league in large part because the Arizona Board of Regents oversees U of A, ASU and Northern Arizona. Coupled with Utah’s departure for the Big 12, that means the Pac-12 is now set to have just four teams in 2024.

It’s not a surprise that the Arizona schools would be a package deal, as Yahoo! Sports’ Ross Dellenger reported on Friday that the board of regents would prefer to keep the flagship universities in the state together.

Additionally, Arizona was in somewhat of a holding pattern, waiting for Oregon and Washington to make a decision on potentially leaving the Pac-12 for the Big Ten. Once Oregon and Washington signaled the intention to leave, it cleared the runway for the Arizona schools to make a move to the Big 12.

The crux of the issue for the Pac-12 stems from the ongoing media rights negotiations. In July 2022 — shortly after USC and UCLA announced their departures for the Big Ten — the Pac-12 said it was starting negotiations on a new media deal immediately. Talks were ongoing and on Aug. 1, 2023, commissioner George Kliavkoff presented a “primary streaming deal” with Apple that would have payouts of around $20 million per year.

Arizona president Robert Robbins remained steadfast he wanted to see what numbers the Pac-12 presented before talking about the university’s athletics future. He got those during Kliavkoff’s initial meeting Aug. 1 and saw two Board of Regents meetings follow. The board didn’t take any action regarding athletics in the first meeting, but it was on the agenda for the second one. However, the meeting immediately went into executive session.

Yormark has shown his ability to be aggressive after taking over for Bob Bowlsby as Big 12 commissioner. The league already had four members coming in to help replace Oklahoma and Texas, which are both leaving for the SEC in 2024. But he took it a step further and got a head start on a media rights deal, coming to a $2.28 billion deal last year to help reset the market and — quite possibly — force the Pac-12’s hand.

As a result, the Pac-12’s future became in doubt. Talks continued, but a deal didn’t come to fruition before the movement began. Prisbell reported the ensuing domino effect could change the entire landscape of college athletics as we know it, and a veteran TV source reaffirmed that.

“If they [the Pac-12] implode, God only knows what happens to college sports,” the source told On3.