Mack Brown shares his reaction to major conference realignment moves

Over the last year, there were some surprising conference realignment moves, including USC and UCLA late last month when they announced they’re leaving the Pac-12 for the Big Ten. Those moves shocked the college athletics world — and North Carolina coach Mack Brown was part of the group that didn’t see them coming.

Brown joined the Always College Football podcast with Greg McElroy to talk about his reaction to the seismic moves. He said it was a similar response to last year’s big move from Texas and Oklahoma from the Big 12 to the SEC. The longtime Longhorns coach said it’s just a sign of the times in college football and how quickly things can change.

“I was on the golf course in the mountains of North Carolina,” Brown said. “A guy calls me and says, ‘Hey, USC and UCLA are going to the Big Ten, I hear.’ I said, ‘Eh, that’s not going to happen. It can’t happen.’ I said the same thing about Texas and Oklahoma. ‘They’re not going to the SEC.’ That was 1:00. By 3:30, it was announced that those two are gone. So things are just happening, Greg, and they’re happening faster than ever before.”

More on the USC, UCLA and the conference realignment domino effect

USC and UCLA will join the Big Ten in 2024 while Oklahoma and Texas are set to join the SEC by 2025. That means change is coming to college football in the next few years, but ESPN’s Pete Thamel said Wednesday he doesn’t think anything else is going to happen in the near future.

“In the micro micro, I think we’re at a collective pause here,” Thamel said on College Football Live. “When I talk to sources around the country — different conferences, different schools — everyone’s wondering what is the next trigger? What is the next mile marker that could lead to more expansion? Right now, the Big Ten and SEC appear to be sitting pat at 16.

“Notre Dame is obviously the prettiest date on the dance floor, but they probably have two years until they have to make any decision because their TV deal has four years left and they need to see what happens with the College Football Playoff, and that also has four years left. So there’s no imminent rush for Notre Dame because the levers that they need to pull to move conferences aren’t going to be pulled in the near term.”