Greg Sankey on the SEC possibly expanding west: 'That's not who we are'

In 2024, two conferences — the Big Ten and the Big 12 — are going west. Eight Pac-12 teams are heading to those leagues as the latest conference realignment shakeup changed the entire landscape.

One conference that has stood still, though, is the SEC. Commissioner Greg Sankey has previously said the conference isn’t looking to expand, and he doubled down on that Thursday night as Week 1 officially got underway.

Expanding westward has come up in Sankey’s meetings with administrators. However, that doesn’t look to be a possibility right now for the SEC.

“We’ve talked to our presidents, our chancellors and our athletics directors and said, ‘Do you want us to look west? Is that something that’s a priority?’ And you know what? Consistently, the answer has been we know who we are, we know our fan base, we know the passion, we know our expectations. That’s not who we are,” Sankey said Thursday on The Paul Finebaum Show. “We’ve got really great geography, high, high-level competition right now. And next year, it goes to, really, almost another level, if that’s possible.”

Greg Sankey: Conference realignment has been ‘fascinating to watch’

The latest round of realignment got underway in late July as the Pac-12’s media rights negotiations appeared to come to a standstill. Colorado was the first team to jump ship as it returned to the Big 12 in late July, but the rest of the departures came a week later.

Arizona, Arizona State and Utah announced they’d join the Buffaloes in the Big 12 in 2024 as part of commissioner Brett Yormark’s “dream scenario” for expansion. That same day, Oregon and Washington shared their plans to join the Big Ten along with USC and UCLA, who had announced their departures a year earlier.

But the initial realignment wave started in 2021 when Oklahoma and Texas announced they were leaving the SEC for the Big 12. Of course, Greg Sankey was in the middle of that and saw the fallout unfold. The Big 12 added four schools — BYU, Cincinnati, Houston and UCF — to help replace the Longhorns and Sooners. The latest wave was just another ripple effect from that decision.

It also meant realignment had to stay relevant in Sankey’s meetings with SEC officials. He makes sure to stay transparent with them, whether he truly knows what’s happening or not. That goes for the current situation with the ACC, which could be nearing westward expansion, as well.

“It’s been fascinating to watch,” Sankey said. “The summer of ’21, I was a part of disruption. The reality for me is with our presidents and chancellors, I’ve spent a lot of time dating back to Oct. 15 — my very first meeting as commissioner — saying, ‘Here’s kind of the landscape. Here are some potential milestones where change could happen. And we need to be thoughtful about what that can mean.’ We do the same thing now. I’ve kept our presidents and chancellors and athletics directors apprised of what I know. When I don’t know things, I also say I don’t know what’s happening. Last year was the Big Ten going west.

“You could see as the Pac-12 was kind of moving towards the finish line on its media negotiations and in Colorado makes the decision — that created probably as much, if not more uncertainty than we’ve ever had. We had that Friday, in early August, where three more teams go to the Big 12, two more teams go to the Big Ten. And now, we’re seeing the question attempt to be answered around other members of the Pac-12. And that’s where we need that answer. It seems clear, although nobody’s telling me that the ACC is in the process of making decisions.”