It’s begun. Conference realignment. First, Colorado leaving the Big 12 moving to the PAC 10, Nebraska leaving the Big 12 moving to the Big Ten and Boise State leaving the WAC for the Mountain West. Next week it looks like Texas, Texas Tech, A&M, Oklahoma and Oklahoma State looking to leave the Big 12 too.

The next four questions are; is this the big one, the major shift in the college conferences or just a tremor? Is this just a few schools making changes that can easily be replaced by other schools with the big one happening later. What will happen to the Big 12? More importantly what does this all mean for North Texas? 

A source close to the North Texas program talked with Eagletalk.net to give some information about what the program is doing.

North Texas does have “it’s eyes and ears open” to everything that is going on as “everyone else in the college world is.” North Texas and many other programs are in the same situation as many football fans are. No one knows what is going to happen and for the most part UNT is in a wait and see mode like the rest of us. No one knows how small or how big this shift will be.

Obviously there were discussions with all the Big 12 schools about Colorado and Nebraska leaving and who could replace them. There were discussions concerning what would happened if Texas, A&M, Texas Tech, Oklahoma and Oklahoma State were to leave and what to do to prevent them from leaving. Until the schools make a decision, the conference will be in a wait and see mode.

The whole re-alignment can be a few teams moving or it could be a major shift into 4, 5 or 6 conferences with 12, 14, or 16 members. For the most part every team and every conference is in a wait and see mode. 

A few months ago everyone believed the Big East would be the conference that would fall apart and the Big 12 safe. It was a wait and see. Now, the Big 12 appears to be falling apart and the Big East safe.   

The wait and see for North Texas does not mean they have not been doing posturing with several conferences. There have been discussions, but Athletic Director Rick Villarreal and his staff has been tight lipped about what is going on behind the scenes with the UNT program. 

“We learned in 1995 what we had to do to make ourselves attractive” to gain admission to a bigger and better conference. At that time, Conference-USA was looking to add another conference member and North Texas was on the short list. However, it was the University of Texas-El Paso that earned the bid. The reason was simple, UTEP had a big stadium and 30,000 fans attending games. North Texas had a football stadium on the level of Division II competition and 13,000 or so fans showing up. “At that time we had no plans for a new stadium.” Since then things have changed for North Texas.

The new stadium and all the other sports facilities that have been upgraded now make North Texas more attractive to other conferences. The only problem is fan support. The location, the student population, the upgrades to the campus and athletic facilities, the overall academic success of the school all make UNT an attractive addition to many conferences. The problem is going to be attendance at the football and basketball games.   

Asked what conferences North Texas has talked with in case they would get an invite we were told which conferences, if any, would not be released because it would be nothing but speculation. However, we were reminded that North Texas is considering any possible offers from any conference and would weigh each offer and make a decision that would place the “athletes in the best environment.” UNT knows the right “conference affiliation is important to the program.”