Ivan Maisel discusses potential for ‘super conference’ era

The Big Ten and the SEC are the two conferences at the forefront of the conference realignment discussion after recent additions. In fact, those two leagues have been discussed as potential “super conferences” in college football.

On3’s Ivan Maisel discussed that possibility this week and how the college football landscape is changing before our eyes.

Maisel said ESPN and FOX are two huge factors in what could wind up being a two-conference landscape. As the dollar signs increase, it could make it tough for the other leagues — the Big 12, ACC and Pac-12 — to keep up.

“I’m sure people in Bristol are crunching numbers just as people at the FOX offices in LA have been crunching numbers and trying to figure out, ‘Is this something worth looking into? Do we need to do this not only to cover our flanks, but to make more money? Can it make more money?'” Maisel told Inside Texas’ Bobby Burton. “That would, really, set in stone what we started talking about at the top which is it’s two conferences. I don’t know.

“To bemoan the passing of college football as we know it, I know that makes me sound like I’m old. I guess when you have appreciated a sport for as long as I’ve appreciated college football and it’s changing so radically, of course you’re going to mourn. It doesn’t mean that what is coming up is going to be rotten. It’s just different.”

Ivan Maisel on the new era of college football

Maisel also said he’s noticed different mindsets from different coaches in college football. He specifically pointed to the SEC spring meetings in June when contrasting opinions emerged about how NIL impacts college football.

“I think if you listen to the SEC coaches in Destin in the spring when an older guy like Saban is complaining about the way NIL is going and the younger coaches are just saying, ‘Yeah, it’ll be fine. It’ll work itself out. I’m not worried.’ That’s what we’re looking at here, to me,” Maisel said. “It’s concerning because so much of what we like about the sport is changing. And then the question is will it change the essence of the appeal of the sport? I don’t think it will. It’s just going to be very different.”