George Kliavkoff updates progress of new Pac-12 media rights deal, potential expansion

The Pac-12 Media Day began without a new media deal in place for the conference. Despite that, Commissioner George Kliavkoff and the rest of the conference remain confident that there will be a deal coming soon.

While giving his opening remarks and answering questions from the media, Kliavkoff did his best to address questions about this deal and the process around it.

“Getting the right deal has always been important, more important to our board and the conference than getting the expeditious,” George Kliavkoff said.

When USC and UCLA announced they were leaving the Pac-12 for the Big Ten, the conference began looking for a new media deal to create some stability for the remaining members. However, since then, no deal has been announced despite consistent rumors about that deal.

“The longer we wait for the media deal, the better our options get,” Kliavkoff said. He also pointed out that the conference is on track to ink a new deal at about the time the conference was initially supposed to do, had the Pac-12 not begun seeking a new media deal early. He said, “In the end, we are on track to announce our deals at about the same time everyone would have predicted before conference realignment. … [the Pac-12] will be rewarded in the near future.”

As questions began, Kliavkoff emphasized that he wants the focus to be on football right now, not the media deal

“We are not announcing our media deal today on purpose because we want the focus to be on football,” George Kliavkoff said. The implication is that the Pac-12 does have a media deal in place, but it wouldn’t be announced. When asked about that, Kliavkoff denied that implication.

“I think you’re reading too much into that… We want to have the focus on football today. We have an incredibly good football story to tell and we want that to be the focus today.”

Colorado’s chancellor says the goal is to remain in the Pac-12

Amid the media rights negotiation for the Pac-12 have been numerous conference realignment rumors. One of those rumors is that Colorado may return to the Big 12. However, the school’s chancellor recently said the goal is to stay in the Big 12.

“[CU’s] goal is to stay within the Pac-12 and have a media deal coming up shortly. That’s our goal. And I believe the presidents and chancellors of the Pac-12 are together on that,” Phil DiStefano told the Denver Post’s Sean Keeler

“I think [the speculation has happened] because there’s not a deal at this point. There’s a lot of talk about [Big 12] expansion. But … I don’t read social media very much so I don’t know what people are saying, but I hope that we’ll have some direction [Thursday] in our meeting.”

At Pac-12 Media Days, George Kliavkoff insisted that he’s not concerned about losing schools amid the media rights negotiation.

“It’s not a concern,” Kliavkoff said. “Our schools are committed to each other and to the Pac-12. We’ll get our media rights deal done, we’ll announce the deal. I think the realignment that’s going on in college athletics will come to an end for this cycle.”