Texas, Oklahoma have inquired about joining the SEC, per report

Two of the biggest brands in college athletics joining forces with the conference that defines college football is something that appears to be in the works, according to the Houston Chronicle.

Texas and Oklahoma of the Big 12 have both reached out to the Southeastern Conference about potentially joining the powerful league, a high-ranking college official with knowledge of the situation told the Houston Chronicle on Wednesday.

An announcement could come within a couple of weeks concerning the potential addition of UT and OU to the league, the person said, which would give the SEC 16 schools and make it the first of a national super-conference.

If you thought NIL rights were disruptive to college sports, you ain’t seen nothing yet. This would change everything about the current balance of power and money in high-major intercollegiate athletics.

The SEC would have basically every major brand in college football outside of USC, Notre Dame, and Ohio State (sorry FSU, not right now). The Big 12 would be in a full-blown crisis without their two signature teams, and likely raids the Mountain West and American conferences looking to shore up their status.

This would also allow for re-negotiated media rights for the SEC, who would be in a position to get even more billions of dollars than they already do from TV and online partners.

The downstream implications here basically touch every aspect of FBS schools in both football and other sports. And the penalty to UT and OU is ... nothing? Their grant of rights to the Big 12 (basically the deal all major conference teams make that ties all their media money to the league) expires in June of 2025.

After that, both schools are free agents and can go anywhere they’d like with no penalty. They could even negotiate an early exit and get this party started even sooner.

We can’t imagine the SEC would ever say no here, and we can’t imagine why this doesn’t make sense for the Red River rivals.

Here we go.