The Pac-12 began evaluating candidates for expansion long before USC and UCLA announced their intentions to leave the conference.
The process commenced in the summer of 2021, after Texas and Oklahoma agreed to join the SEC and the Big 12 lurched toward the brink of extinction.
Pac-12 presidents ultimately passed on extending membership invitations and concluded none of the available schools (in the Big 12 or elsewhere) met the competitive, financial and institutional criteria.
Now here we are, 21 months later, and the Pac-12’s geographic footprint features a crater in Southern California as the conference negotiates a new media rights contract and considers expansion.
The candidate list includes SMU.