Recruiting the Universities
College Football in the Eternal Present
My original plan for this article was to capitalize on the excitement for the upcoming college football season by writing about some of the most storied rivalries in college football history. The main thrust of the piece would have been to educate our readers not only about college football history but also to give life and significance to the traditions and rituals both fans and players engage in every autumn. These traditions give meaning to the game beyond just the twenty-two young men vying for field position. These traditions ingratiate the fans into the drama on the gridiron beyond being mere spectators. Traditions, especially rivalries, make the past seem alive and instill a sense of pride in both fans and players alike, reminding them that there is something to pass down to future generations who will don the school colors next.
That was supposed to be my article, but within a few weeks, the entire landscape of college football has completely changed in ways that would have seemed absurd a decade ago. The University of Washington and the University of Oregon announced at the beginning of this month that they would be leaving the Pac-12 Conference for the Big Ten Conference. The University of Arizona, Arizona State University, and the University of Utah all announced on the same day that they would be joining the Big 12 Conference. All of these moves came after the University of Colorado announced in July that it would be leaving the Pac-12 for the Big 12, returning to the conference that it had left in 2011.
Conference realignments or conferences falling apart is nothing new. Even the previously mentioned Pac-12 was made up of schools that had previously been members of the Pacific Coast Conference before that body fell into ruin after scandal in 1959. What we haven’t seen before are these super-conferences acquiring more and more teams that now span across regions where they’ve never before had a presence. The Big Ten, traditionally a conference made up of Midwestern schools, sits atop the super-conferences with 18 member schools, as it now has teams in Maryland, New Jersey, Oregon, Washington, and California. The Southeastern Conference has stretched beyond its traditional borders, now reaching the plains of Oklahoma, and has added a second school from Texas, for a total of 16 members. The Big 12 for most of its history encompassed the South-Central region of the United States, but it will be welcoming members from Ohio, Utah, and Florida, bringing its member team count up to 16.
On top of the transfer portal, which allows athletes to switch schools without having to sit out a year, and NIL (“name, image, and likeness”) deals, which allow athletes to make money off their likeness, these new conference realignments are part of yet another major shift in changing college football into something completely different from what it was not that long ago. It marks a loss of mystique in the game, regions and proximity no longer mattering, and decades-old rivalries being broken up because there’s always more money to be made in forming a new super-conference and getting the maximum payout from television deals.
I’ve never been privy to the financials behind college football and how much money the sport generates. But when I see how abruptly rivalries and traditions of the past can be severed by teams joining new conferences with no regional history, it seems fruitless to talk about the history of the game and its great rivalries. College football is now no longer a connection to the past for some schools. The game can only exist in the eternal present, always seeking new opportunities to make more money and chase better deals. The echoes of the past are drowned out by the commercials of the present. In today’s day and age, no amount of history will stop a school from jumping ship. Thus, tradition is relegated to the status of “unprofitable.”
New rivalries will be formed. Some will of course be forced, but they all will end up being entirely synthetic regardless. If you only live in the present, committed solely to finding the best way to get a guaranteed paycheck, no amount of nostalgia can top the almighty dollar, and no number of new rivalries can recoup what has already been lost. College football is a game marked by a rich past with rivalries that ran deeper than most people could ever fully grasp. We’re coming to a point where we may not have anything to pass down to the next generations of fans and athletes. The stadiums will still stand, the programs will be in full swing, and the audience will always be there. I fear that it is the spirit of the game itself, cultivated by over 150 years of history, tradition, and rivalries, which will be lost in the years to come.