Oklahoma Sooners Football: Boren Reportedly Against Big 12 Expansion, Denies Report

According to a report from Sports Illustrated’s Pete Thamel, Oklahoma President David Boren has changed his stance on Big 12 Expansion, now wishing for the conference to stay at 10 schools. Previously, Boren had stated that the Big 12 was “psychologically disadvantaged” at 10 schools, and he’s been the face of expansion ever since.

Earlier today, ESPN’s Jake Trotter posted the following tweet with a statement from Boren.

Folks became worried when Boren stated at a BOR meeting earlier this month that conference expansion was not a given. Today’s rumblings have stirred the pot even more, and despite Boren’s denial, it appears that we won’t be adding teams to our league anytime soon.

If the report is indeed true, it serves as further evidence that the league’s presidents are incapable of compromise. The smaller schools are paranoid about Houston taking their recruits, and BYU’s honor code is a potential impediment to their admittance. The rest of the candidates have strengths and weaknesses, but the weaknesses seem to outweigh the strengths. I’m not sure if they’ll ever be able to come to a consensus.

In the grand scheme of things, will any of this matter a decade from now? OU is going to be on the move once the GOR starts winding down, and we’ll have new schools to complain about. In my opinion, I think we should head to the SEC and bring Okie State with us. Yes, it would be more of a challenge, but it would be much more entertaining. Would you rather watch a more physical (and probably more talented) OU squad battle it out on Owen Field against the likes of Alabama, LSU, Georgia and Florida, or are you content with watching a finesse OU team compete in a snooze fest with Iowa State? Give me the former any day.

“But what about the Big Ten?”

No. If you think blue-chip recruits from Texas, California, Louisiana and Florida would be on board with playing November games in Madison, Minneapolis and Iowa City, you need to put the crack pipe down. Sure you’d sometimes have games against Ohio State, Michigan and Penn State, but you’d have a ton of boring games against Purdue, Indiana and the like.

“But what about Nebraska?”

Would you pass up games against SEC powers just to rekindle a rivalry with a program that is a shell of its former self? I’m not on board with that. At all.