Changing Places

From Insider Higher Ed: The University of Southern California and the University of California, Los Angeles, two bedrock members of the Pacific-12 Conference, announced late Thursday that they will leave their longtime home on the West Coast for the Big Ten Conference, the traditional bastion of Midwestern athletics that in recent years has expanded all the way to New Jersey.*

The shift, which will be effective in 2024—after the Pac-12’s current television contracts expire, USC noted in its news release—is the latest in a decade-long seismic shift in the landscape of big-time college football and men’s basketball that has blown up historical geographic boundaries and rivalries in universities’ pursuit of greater revenues.

The addition of USC and UCLA will give the Big Ten league 16 members (it currently has 14, as does the Southeastern Conference), and their departure will be a gut punch for the Pac-12, losing two key members in its largest television market, Los Angeles...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2022/07/01/usc-ucla-sports-leaving-pacific-12-big-ten-conference.

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*UCLA's announcement is at:

https://uclabruins.com/news/2022/6/30/bruin-athletics-ucla-to-join-big-ten-conference-at-start-of-2024-25-season.aspx.