The new PAC-12 found its main media partner.
Now it’s time to finalize the next member school.
The League extends its agreement with CBS Sports throughout the 2030-31 season as a media anchoring platform for the new conference, opening the way to the next PAC-12 rebirth phase: expansion.
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The conference officials are committed to conversations with Texas State leaders, according to sources, while the two parties work on a membership agreement that would start in the fall of 2026. Although no agreement is finalized, this one month’s nuptial parade should reach a crescendo this week, when the formal extension of an invitation can be made.
The addition of Texas State, a Sun Belt school located in San Marcos, Texas, would give the CAP -12 an eighth full member of football – a requirement of the NCAA of all the FBS leagues. Expansion would be the last decision of a progressive reconstruction of a conference which, in 2023, is found with the state of Washington and the state of Oregon. PAC-12 added five Mountain West (San Diego State, Boisse State, Colorado State, Fresno State and Utah State) programs and added Gonzaga basketball power before entering negotiations this spring with several media partners for a new television agreement.
CBS will anchor the Multiplateme media pack of the League with up to four partners expected on a later date. The total value of this package remains clear, although the annual figure per final school should fall towards the lower range of a projection that the conference showed expansion objectives last year (8-15 million dollars).
The potential departure of the state of Texas in relation to the solar belt – if an agreement is concluded – should trigger a chain of realignment movements within the group of six conferences. Sun Belt officials, in fact, have already organized an internal discussion on the objectives of potential extent in the USA conference, notably Louisiana Tech and western Kentucky, according to those who know the talks.
Head coach GJ Kinne and the Texas State Bobcats won the first answering machine in a match against Northern Texas last season. (Sam Hodde / Getty Images)
(Sam Hodde via Getty Images)
Time is essence for one of these conference movements.
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Most programs must give their conference in progress at least 12 months notice before any planned exit or risk larger exit costs. For example, the Sun Belt exit costs from Texas State are $ 5 million if the school gives the conference before July 1 that it leaves in July 2026. This double -day figure.
Exit costs for Conference USA programs are expected to be in the range of $ 5 to 7 million, as it includes two years of retained income distribution and a penalty for having broken the League’s rights concession agreement. There are $ 5 million entry fees in the Sun Belt – a figure that could be negotiated at the discretion of the League Presidents’ Council.
If the state of Texas is offered an invitation PAC-12 to a complete distribution, the school should accept.
For the state of Texas, this decision would be a spectacular increase in the revenues of conferences to its chests, which doubles more than to double the payment of the solar belt at a time when Griffon schools for any new financial aid while the industry is entering the age of sharing the income of athletes. The bobcats, the members of the 12 -year -old Sun Belt after starting the transition from FCS in 2011, have a story of success in football at the lower levels. They won the national titles in Division II in 1981-1982 and qualified for the FCS semi-finals in 2005.
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This decision would give the CAP-12 a foot in the second most populous state in the country. The new PAC-12 has two schools in the most populous state, in California.
The question of whether the PAC-12 would extend an invitation to any other program is not clear. Last year, the League offered mandate sheets to at least three American schools, all of which postponed the offer: Memphis, Tulane and southern Florida. The American’s release is delivered with a penalty of up to $ 20 million.
Poaching of other Mountain West programs, such as UNLV, is also a high obstacle. The members of the Radema Mountain West agreed with a binding subsidy of rights. To replace those who left for the PAC-12, the league added Hawaii, Utep, Grand Canyon, the North of Illinois in football and UC Davis in all sports except football.
The Mountain West and the PAC-12, considered for years as Western sisters conferences, are mired in a legal dispute on the costs of exit and penalty on the departure of the five schools at the PAC-12. The two conferences had mediation several weeks ago. These negotiations continue more than $ 150 million in exit and penalty costs that the Mountain West believes that the PAC-12 and its new members must.
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The PAC-12, rebuilds the direction of Commissioner Teresa Gould, occupies an interesting place in the sports hierarchy of the college. While the conference has lost its autonomous status as an electricity league within the NCAA and the governance structures of the NCAA and university football playoffs, the conference remains involved in historical changes in university sports linked to the antitrust colony of the Chamber.
The PAC-12, as well as the NCAA, Big Ten, dry, Big 12 and AC, are appointed defendants in the trial which introduces the sharing of industry income with athletes. The administrators of the League, in fact, should visit the legislators this week in Washington, DC, while industry leaders continue to put pressure for a federal university sports bill.
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The PAC-12 agreement with CBS extends an agreement of one year concluded earlier this year for the network to televise two football games: the Apple Cup on September 20 and the first of the two games between the state of Washington and the Oregon State on November 1.
As part of the CBS package, the network will broadcast the League football championship match and the male basketball tournament championship, as well as at least three football and male basketball basketball games on CBS and Paramount +. More regular seasonal matches are expected on CBS Sports Network. All the details of the agreement are not disclosed because the league is still on the market to finalize the media rights agreements for more distribution of football, basketball and Olympic sports with other partners.
The conference uses Octagon as an advisor because it seeks more media agreements.