Conference Shuffle

Over the past few years the college conferences have seen a massive shake up. Conferences are losing institutions while others are gaining, and teams are continuing to jump conferences. It was just announced that there will be two additional teams joining the Big 10 conference in the coming years. Maryland announced yesterday that it will be joining the Big 10 in 2014, and Rutgers has just announced today that it too will be joining the Big 10. Personally as a fan of the Big 10 I don’t like this move. It is clearly for economic reasons and by having those schools join the Big 10 they can reach a new market in the east coast.

However, this isn't the biggest problem I have with schools jumping to new conferences. I feel like it is too easy for schools to jump conferences and what is there to stop a school from joining a new conference for a few years then deciding they want to join a new conference and leave again. I preferred the old setup where schools stayed in your conference and rivalries were built year in and year out. Also, after this move can you even call it the Big 10 anymore? I felt like it was a stretch to continue to call it the Big 10 after Nebraska joined and put the total members up to 12. Now that the conference will be at 14 members should the name be changed? All I know is that schools need to stop changing conferences because I feel like it is hurting college sports.

Logan Potter

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