Volume 6, No. 5

BIG FISH BIGGER POND Five years into the Big XII, is A&M better off? By Homer Jacobs

It’s been five years worth of games on the big stage and revenue streams rattling the cage. It’s been five years worth of Kansas State-Texas A&M thrillers and Nebraska-Texas chillers.

It’s been tournament baseball at the Bricktown Ballpark and mile high football in the Rocky Mountains.

But the Big 12 Conference also has been five years worth of puddle-jumping flights to Manhattan, Kan., and tournament basketball at Kemper Arena.

It’s been North-South bickering and breakfast football the day after Thanksgiving.

In any case, the Big 12 is not the Southwest Conference. But has that been a good thing for Texas A&M and its fans?

Well, depending on which coach from which sport you talk to, both conferences had their strengths and inherent weaknesses. But every coach and administrator associated with Aggie athletics realizes the SWC had to go the way of the leisure suit… locked in a closet forever.

LET’S MAKE A DEAL

Back in the early 1990s, television revenue in football and men’s basketball was all the talk. As much as today has been a facilities arms race for collegiate athletic programs, a decade ago saw schools posturing and positioning for a new era of superconferences and television contracts.

The Southeastern Conference, a long-time visionary among the bigger conferences, saw the opportunity to expand to lock down the South and grab a bigger portion of the national television pie.

The Aggies received major exposure after the 1998 Big 12 title game.

It courted four schools, but really wanted to propose to only two – A&M and Texas.

But legislative resistance in the state of Texas stalled the talks between the SEC and the two state superpowers. The SEC finally looked at Arkansas and South Carolina as two schools who could fill out their 12-team dream.

So how close were A&M and Texas to bolting east? Well, A&M seemed more eager for an SEC hookup than Texas, which somehow fancied itself among the academic types of the Pac-10.

"I do know it was a serious consideration," said A&M athletic director Wally Groff of A&M’s flirtation with leaving the SWC for the SEC. "But I don’t know if we ever got that close to going through. There were serious discussions going on, however."

Just a few years later, the talks heated up again about A&M and Texas leaving a regionalized and dying SWC. After all, with Arkansas already out of the conference picture, the league was but a one-state grouping of large state universities and smaller private ones.

Sure, A&M and Texas had some television clout, but did SMU and Houston? And did the rest of the nation really care about what the Aggies and Owls did on a Saturday afternoon? No way.

But just as the SWC was floundering, the Big Eight began pondering. Outside of Kansas City and St. Louis, the Big Eight’s television markets were weak, and the image of the Big Three – Nebraska, Colorado and Oklahoma – dominating the league’s football scene wasn’t promoting parity.

And so like two seventh-graders coming across the gym floor for their first dance, four teams from the SWC and the old Big Eight grabbed hands in 1996, awkwardly at first, and began this partnership that has been as fluid as a waltz at times and clumsy as the Chicken Dance at others.

BIG BUCKS IN THE BIG 12

There’s no question the No. 1 reason the SWC dissolved and the Big 12 emerged was the possibility of revenue windfalls. And the financial intake, mostly from television contracts for football and men’s basketball, has been impressive.

The possibility for $100 million television contracts for football turned heads immediately, definitely grabbing the interest of Groff.

The old days of the Southwest Conference were filled with some great A&M teams, but the lack of competition hurt A&M's perception.

"Financially, it’s been a good thing for us in terms of the contracts we worked out with the Big 12 for television," Groff said. "I think our revenue generated through the Big 12 is two or three times what it was in the Southwest Conference. That’s very positive for an old bottom-line guy.

"In the Southwest Conference (for football), we were getting on television four or five times a year, and now we’re getting on seven or eight times a year. There’s some additional costs involved, but the income far outweighs the additional costs."

Perhaps no other school in the Big 12 has seen its budget increase as a direct result of membership in the conference as much as Texas A&M. Not only did A&M jump into the big-time television pool with football and men’s basketball, but attendance at Kyle Field has dramatically risen as a result of facilities improvements and scheduling enhancements.

Just 10 years ago, A&M was averaging in the low 60,000 range for football attendance. Last year, with games against old Big Eight powers like Colorado and Oklahoma, the average number soared to over 78,000.

In 2002, Big 12 home games with Nebraska, Oklahoma and Texas Tech could all average in the 85,000 stratosphere.

Even men’s basketball, a longtime black hole for big crowds, has seen monster crowds with Kansas every other year. And baseball attendance at Olsen Field continues to remain in the top five nationally despite down years for Mark Johnson’s club in 2000-2001.

"Having more marquee games across the board for all of our sports has been a big positive for us," Groff added.

The Big 12 has made a huge impact on Texas A&M's football attendance, which averaged over 78,000 last fall.

Yet, for all of the television contracts the Big 12 has been able to land – and not signing with college-savvy ESPN has been a negative for football – the conference bottom-liners cringe every fiscal year when the travel agents call.

Indeed, the days of busing to Houston and Fort Worth are long gone.

"Obviously, for all of your sports, you’re having to go north a lot further to compete on a round-robin basis," Groff said. "And some of that has been offset by a divisional approach to scheduling.

"We knew that was coming and knew that was something we would have to overcome. But we felt like the revenue would more than offset it, and I think it definitely has."

Still, traveling to games in Stillwater, Okla. or Columbia, Mo. has not been easy. In fact, horror stories of charter flights bouncing through Nebraska snowstorms and Oklahoma thunderstorms are common.

Ironically, football season is the easiest travel scenario for A&M, as large charter jets are used, and travel occurs only five times a year. But for the non-revenue sports, the travel in the Big 12 is one big headache… and financial strain.

In the SWC, Groff budgeted approximately $1.5 million for travel. In the Big 12, that number doubled to $3,027,000 for 2000-2001.

CHAMPIONSHIPS HARD TO COME BY

In 1985-86, the Aggies cashed in with a championship trifecta in the Southwest Conference. The "Big Three" sports of football, men’s basketball and baseball all won at least a share of the SWC title.

In five full years of Big 12 membership, A&M has won seven Big 12 regular-season championships, with baseball owning a pair of the big trophies with back-to-back titles in 1998-99. The men’s tennis team has garnered the most hardware of any A&M sport since 1996, with one regular-season championship and three Big 12 Tournament titles.

In football, the Aggies won six conference titles in the SWC from 1985-93, while taking two South Division titles in the Big 12 from 1997-98, winning the league championship over KSU in the 1998 classic overtime thriller.

But it’s been a two-year drought since A&M even flirted with a conference title in football, basketball or baseball.

"We have 12 schools instead of eight, so your chances are 50 percent less annually to be competitive in any sport and have a chance to win a championship," Groff said. "Most of our fans understand that. I think there are some still who think we should be first or second every year in the Big 12. I would love to be there, and that’s a possibility. But realistically, I don’t think that’s very probable.

"If you go back and look at football, we’ve had five seasons. And we won the championship once and the South twice. In the South, nobody’s done any better than that. And in the North, only Nebraska and Kansas State have dominated. In the South, there’s been three schools (win the South)."

In baseball, the Aggies have been as successful as any Big 12 program, even with the mediocre years of 2000-01. Yet, A&M coach Mark Johnson misses the old days in the SWC.

After all, the league was comprised of good baseball schools, with Arkansas, Rice and Houston offering quality competition for the Aggies and Longhorns. And for a sport that never receives much national attention anyway, why move to a new conference where the exposure factor remains about the same from a media standpoint?

"I’m biased because the Southwest Conference was so traditionally strong," said Johnson, who came to Aggieland in 1983. "When I came into it, I really enjoyed it. As you get older, sometimes you like things better the way they were. I don’t think Wally or the presidents made a mistake because they had to do it. But from a baseball-only standpoint, the Southwest Conference was really special.

"Certainly, we’ve enjoyed the Big 12 and the prestige it brings. It’s a little bit tough for me because I came into the Southwest Conference and knew all about it. When you change it all around, you had some loyalties that were there, and it wasn’t broken. But that’s the nature of the beast in athletics nowadays. The TV revenue with football and basketball really made it something that, as an athletic director, I would have done."

While A&M and Texas were the kingpins of baseball back in the SWC, thanks in large part to palatial facilities, the onset of the Big 12 has pushed schools like Baylor, Texas Tech, Nebraska and Missouri to upgrade their baseball stadiums.

While Olsen Field remains the king of college baseball as far as atmosphere goes, the Baylor Ballpark rules as far as aesthetics and amenities.

And all of the facility improvements have spread out the talent base, already diluted by the 11.7 scholarship rule.

"Jumping into the Big 12 has helped a lot of baseball programs, which in the big picture should be part of our goal," Johnson added. "Everybody in our conference has improved their facilities since the Big 12 opened up with baseball.

"It’s good for Nebraska, the Kansas schools, Missouri and our schools (in Texas). The baseball is reaching a higher level from within all the programs, so in that regard, it’s been very good. When I got here, Texas and Texas A&M had the only facilities in the state. Now you look at Texas Tech, Baylor, Rice and Houston, and the talent is being spread out amongst those schools. They’re not all going to one school or the other school. They have good choices."

EXPOSURE, EXPOSURE, EXPOSURE

While peering down press row at Kyle Field for an important Big 12 football game, you can mingle with writers and broadcasters from all over the heartland. Writers from nationally-respected newspapers like the St. Louis Dispatch and Kansas City Star are now part of the media fraternity.

Sportscasts in Denver now scroll scores of games from College Station, while special broadcasts like ESPN’s "Gameday" finally have found their way from the state of Florida to places like Aggieland.

When the Aggies played in the SWC, the same ol’ writers from the same ol’ newspapers gave the same ol’ accounts of games in College Station. Today, stories of the vertigo reporters experience in a swaying Kyle Field press box are routinely posted in Big 12 newspapers and Internet sites each fall.

Finally, our little secret in College Station is going national.

"I think the biggest thing is that it’s definitely a stronger conference, and the negative aspect of that is it makes it a little tougher to compete," Groff said. "But I think being in the stronger conference, we get much more national recognition than we ever thought about getting in the old Southwest Conference."

With the added exposure, recruits take notice, as well. Just ask the A&M men’s basketball program, which has been able to land more national recruits than ever before.

"I think what it shows is the power of the media," said A&M assistant basketball coach Tom Billeter, who coached at Rice during the SWC’s heyday. "Why the Texases and Texas A&Ms were looking to leave the Southwest Conference – even as great a conference as it was – was because they needed to go because of the media. I think that’s all of it.

"We’re probably able to get more exposure being in the Big 12 than we ever would have gotten in the Southwest Conference even from the vantage point of we haven’t been in the (NCAA) tournament. Two years ago, we had a national TV game against Kansas, and we need those things. We need national television exposure on ESPN, because that really helps us with our program."

Billeter said he remembers his days at Rice when rumors were flying that the SWC was in line to grab ESPN’s first-ever "Big Monday" slot. But probation-scarred teams were unable to make appearances, scaring ESPN to look toward the Big East. It was a move still being felt in college basketball 15 years later.

"The Big East became what it is today," said Billeter, "and the Southwest Conference is no more."

On the flip side of being a Big 12 member, a program like A&M’s basketball outfit has had problems competing in a very strong league loaded with former Big Eight powers. Only Texas has really been able to compete annually with Kansas, Oklahoma State, Oklahoma and Missouri.

The positive aspect of being in such a demanding league, is that an upper-half finish in the conference guarantees either an NCAA or NIT bid. In the SWC days, only a top-three finish could assure postseason action.

"I like the Big 12 and like selling the Big 12 as an assistant coach and as a program," Billeter said. "However, I think the Southwest Conference was a league we could have competed a little bit better in at this time. And you might have been able to get NIT or NCAA bids, and that also promotes your program. We know we’re going to do that in time here, it’s just been a little bit of a slower process."

IS THE SEC A BETTER FIT?

There’s little debate that the Big 12 is a much more productive and exciting conference than the SWC. It was a solid financial move for Texas A&M and the rest of the Big 12 members.

And I doubt any A&M fan would trade a football game with Nebraska or Oklahoma for a rematch with the Horned Frogs at Amon Carter Stadium.

But the Big 12 is inherently a league of schools that have little in common geographically, not to mention demographically.

The weather is drastically different from Central Texas to Central Missouri. The popularity among fans for different sports seems skewed, as well, most notably with baseball in the South vs. basketball in the North.

So maybe a move to the SEC five or 10 years ago might have been the perfect ticket. Texas A&M, after all, is a southern school who prides itself on that old southern tradition – college football.

College Station is to Tuscaloosa as heat is to humidity, and are there any better places to watch college football than at Kyle Field or Tennessee’s Neyland Stadium?

"Both of them are fine conferences," Groff said. "Probably the Big Eight needed the four schools from the Southwest as much or more than we needed them. But it was a great fit, and we became immediate partners. Had we moved into the Southeastern Conference, we would have had to adjust to them and might have taken a little longer to become one of the big guys."

A&M men’s tennis coach Tim Cass says the Big 12 schools need to keep on eye on the SEC, but not fix a gaze on their southern counterparts.

"My conversations with the Big 12 office is to think about being the No. 1 conference in the country," Cass said. "I think as a conference, the Big 12 can be the best conference in the country, I really do. And that’s in all sports. I would hope that’s the 10-year goal of this conference.

"The thing that kind of bugs me a little bit is they ask, ‘What is the SEC or Pac-10 doing?’ We’re not the Pac-10, so we should look at what we’re doing as a conference. It’s almost like we’re playing catch-up to them as opposed to saying, ‘This is what we know they have done, but what can we do better?’"

Even though it’s been just five years since the inception of the Big 12, there continues to be subtle talk nationally about even more conference realignment, moving toward a futuristic world of 64 football-playing schools competing in four superconferences.

"I don’t see that happening," Groff said. "I guess it’s a possibility, but I think this league is here to stay."

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