How the Big 12 Was Born

This story originally appeared in the Winter 2023 issue of POSSE Magazine.

Maybe, just maybe, the world of college athletics would be much different today if Cliff Speegle would have had more success as a head football coach.

Speegle was the Cowboys' football coach from 1955 until 1962. His Oklahoma A&M and Oklahoma State football teams were a lackluster 36-42-2. His squads never beat rivals Oklahoma or Arkansas, and he departed Stillwater prior to the 1963 season. Speegle continued to coach at various levels and was ultimately hired by the Southwest Conference (SWC) to oversee football officiating. He would become the league's commissioner in 1973.

Speegle landed the job at the SWC at the urging of Arkansas athletic director Frank Broyles and Texas athletic director Darrell Royal. This was one of the few things — at the time — Broyles and Royal would agree upon.

Chuck Neinas had a different track en route to the commissioner's role at the Big Eight Conference. He was not a former coach and didn't come from a campus background. He was on the NCAA staff and a natural choice to take over leadership of the league when Wayne Duke departed for the Big Ten's commissioner job. Neinas' roles at the NCAA put him into proximity to the commissioners of the ACC, Big Ten, Pac-8, WAC, SEC, Big Eight and other "major college" football playing leagues.

When Speegle passed, Oklahoma State great Dick Soergel recalled Speegle had the "highest integrity" and Neinas himself told the Daily Oklahoman: "To those of us in the commissioners' ranks, he was our most respected brother."

Speegle and Neinas were cut from the same cloth, bonded as colleagues and were close friends.

But even the highly-regarded, and well-respected Speegle could not placate Arkansas' perspective as the outlier in the Texas-centric SWC, where Texas and Texas A&M wielded the most power. Despite the fact it was a name-brand school, competed well regionally and nationally in all sports — and its athletic director, Frank Broyles, was an ABC football color commentator alongside Keith Jackson each Saturday — the Hogs believed themselves to be on the short end of the stick in most SWC decisions. Every revenue discussion, every scheduling issue, every sportsmanship complaint, every matter important to Arkansas seemed to favor some team from Texas. Whether real, perceived or just paranoid, Arkansas felt like the proverbial bastard-step-brother-in-law rather than an equal partner. They wanted out of the SWC and were seeking a landing spot.

So …

Broyles approached Neinas about joining the Big Eight. As anyone who has lived through college realignment since the early 1990s can attest, it is abundantly clear these things are done in a most clandestine fashion. Even in the early 1970s — a period without the endless 24-hour news cycle and a Twitter/social media universe — discussions of this nature were as stealth as possible but could only be kept secret for a brief period.

Broyles was astute and low-key. He approached Neinas informally to gauge the interest of the Big Eight. But the Big Eight commissioner was clear, he would not act or react to any request or discussion without informing his good friend Speegle. It was there the discussion cooled, if not died.

By the end of the '70s, Neinas had departed the Big Eight, at the urging of nearly everybody in college athletics, to lead the College Football Association. Formed shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of Oklahoma and Georgia (against the NCAA pertaining to television rights), the CFA was designed primarily as a lobbying group to stand up for the rights of the major football playing institutions against the voting power of the entire NCAA Division I structure. Many believed the CFA was formed solely to help administer, negotiate and regulate television rights … in part, maybe; but that was not its primary role. Neinas was the right person for the job.

If nothing else, Carl James was prudent. As Neinas' replacement at the Big Eight, he was more of a "make-the-trains-run-on-time" leader. James preferred the conference office take its lead from the membership on action items, rather than setting the agenda. He directed his staff to build great championships, maximize television opportunities, return as much revenue as possible to the membership and provide great services in academics, officiating and enforcement.

Less than two years into James' tenure, Speegle would retire from the Southwest Conference and be replaced by MAC Commissioner Fred Jacoby. This was the opportunity the Razorbacks had been seeking. Seizing the moment, Broyles asked James for a meeting. James listened. James pondered. James worked behind the scenes to gauge the interest from his membership … managing to do so without revealing an agenda.

He told Arkansas there was no interest.

It is unclear if Broyles was working Big Eight athletic directors behind the scenes, but he approached James a second time. Arkansas was a natural geographical fit. This time the Big Eight boss agreed to take the request to the membership; but he was not sold there was a positive impact. The Razorbacks travelled well in football and the addition would have guaranteed a huge increase in fans per home football game for the current Big Eight schools. Except for Colorado, every Big Eight opponent was within a six-hour game day drive. Play Oklahoma State in Stillwater in even years, with Arkansas at home in odd years and the Oklahoma State ticket office could not have printed enough season tickets. It would have guaranteed greater on-campus basketball attendance as Arkansas was building quite the program under a head coach named Eddie Sutton, and the already sold-out Big Eight Tournament in Kansas City would have reached new heights.

But were the future television dollars there? Arkansas is not a high population state. The Hogs were a strong national television attraction and having your AD sit beside Keith Jackson every weekend didn't hurt their coast-to-coast appeal.

Largely due to the James' influence the answer was still no. He believed this decision was prudent not only for the Big Eight but also for the SWC … and the enterprise of college athletics overall. Expansion of this type would have a long-lasting impact on all of college sports and that might not be good for the faithful. Also, it was clear the Big Eight athletic directors could do the math in a cash-strapped era — eight mouths to feed were enough. It's tough to cut a pie nine ways!

During this period, the Big Eight shared football and basketball gate revenue on a sliding scale/percentage basis. Additional revenue sources were the NCAA basketball championship, the Big Eight Tournament, a football telecast deal with ABC and a regionally syndicated basketball package produced by various entities after 1984. Prior to 1984, the NCAA controlled all of college football telecast rights and fans were limited to eight weekends with one, single nationally televised game. On five weekends there were a handful of regionally televised games.

The Big Eight's footprint was roughly eight percent of the television households nationally. The state of Texas was about eight percent as well. Arkansas did not move the needle much for either conference financially.

Perhaps the Big Eight was being short-sighted, but there was no real consensus to alter the structure of regionality. There was no interest in altering the current collegiate model. There was no incentive to pursue change.

It wouldn't take long for the collegiate landscape to transform. There were independents — like Penn State, South Carolina, Florida State — that were struggling with scheduling, television rights and common collegial purpose.

They needed a home. And as for Arkansas? The door finally opened around 1990 when the Hogs joined South Carolina in the expanded SEC.

The CFA remained a strong organization even though the Big Ten and Pac-8 were not members of the group. In fact, the two conferences benefited from the impact the CFA was having on NCAA legislation related to recruiting, grants-in-aid, coaching limits and transforming the voting power within the national structure.

The transformation continued as television rights fees began to register small increases. This change was primarily due to the emergence of a small cable television entity with huge aspirations. It was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network, or, ESPN. It wouldn't stay small for long.

In short, the Big Ten and Pac-8 already controlled their own rights, and then the SEC left the CFA package and went out on its own. This was huge news at the time.

Jacoby, the SWC commish, called James. The two agreed there should be informal discussions on strengthening the two conferences in the marketplace and such ensued via phone calls, faxes and sidebar discussions during Collegiate Commissioners Association meetings. James agreed to a more formal sit down but thought a commissioner-to-commissioner meeting might raise awareness to a level he was not seeking. So, he dispatched an assistant commissioner to meet with the SWC boss.

The Big Eight developed information on possible football scheduling alliances, football television negotiating opportunities, football officiating alignments and other pertinent topics. With materials prepared and approved by James, the assistant went to Dallas on a Thursday morning prior to the annual Oklahoma-Texas football game to meet with the SWC commissioner.

The SWC staff was equally prepared. But instead of a one-on-one meeting with Jacoby, the Big Eight representative sat down with Jacoby and several SWC staffers. The discussion centered on football, but basketball, baseball and other sports were on the agenda. The SWC was proposing a full-blown merger of the two conferences. The Big Eight rep was a bit befuddled … this was beyond expectations.

On Monday, James was apprised of the discussions and called Jacoby to indicate the scope of the SWC presentation exceeded his current comfort level. Jacoby explained the presentation was an outline of the "possibilities" of how a great alliance could be implemented in stages. James had his doubts and thought it to be a hard sell to his conference membership.

Unbeknownst to James, Oklahoma AD Donnie Duncan and Texas AD DeLoss Dodds were monitoring the national landscape and having discussions of their own, perhaps that very weekend. Dodds had gleaned from insiders that in the next television negotiation each league would likely earn approximately $8 million per year. Duncan's intel confirmed those numbers. Pressed further, it was determined the Big Eight plus Texas and Texas A&M (10 teams as opposed to 16) would generate the same revenue — $16 million total.

Dodds, a former Kansas State coach and athletic director and Big Eight staff member, had long been concerned about the lack of financial commitment many of the current SWC members were making to football. He believed they were surviving financially at the expense of the Longhorns and the Aggies and not putting enough money back into the coffers. Duncan convinced Dodds all the members of the Big Eight were committed financially to expanding athletics within their schools and the conference. Texas and Oklahoma could both benefit from this partnership.

Politics is tough in the state of Texas.

Texas and A&M were not going anywhere without Texas Tech and Baylor. The cracks in the SWC began to show. So there was a plan to split the pie 12 ways; and, with 12 members came two divisions. The revenue from a football championship game would likely pay great dividends.

James was not a fan of the plan. He knew this could, and probably would, start a chain reaction down the line that would change the face of college athletics. But he was loyal to the Big Eight members, even if it meant the SWC could cease to exist. And what about loyalty? You can't deposit it in a checking account. It brought joy to only a few when the Big 12 was formed and officially opened its doors for business on July 1, 1996.

The first television contract for the Big 12 (1996-97) was for $22.5 million (or $100 million over four years). ABC/ESPN balked greatly at the amount and agreed to allow the Big 12 a second television package with selections allowed after the network made its primary picks. Thus, a new player emerged in the TV landscape as the Big 12 opened the door for FOX Sports to enter the marketplace.

It is interesting to note the initial combined offer from ESPN and FOX was for $97 million over a four-year period. In the final stage of negotiations Nebraska athletic director Bill Byrne, unrehearsed and without input from anyone else on the Big 12 side, looked FOX representative Dave Almstead directly in the eyes and said, "you know $100 million sounds a helluva lot better than $97 million." Almstead smiled, tilted his head to the right and said, "Deal." The Big 12 got a quick raise and FOX was in the college football business.

The contracts amounted to roughly $2 million per year per school, $22.5 million per year. Today, there are single games valued at more than $20 million. The $100 million for the first four years of the Big 12 increased to $123 million for the 2011-12 academic year alone. And by 2022-23 the Big 12 was earning $246 million per year. These amounts were in the middle of the pack based on per-school distribution among the so-called Power Five conferences.

Regardless of the conference, there's never enough in the checking account. And, as previously noted, you can't deposit loyalty therein. So what has transpired since expansion began in earnest:

• The South Carolina/Arkansas move to the SEC, along with Florida State (ACC), Penn State (Big Ten) and others shifts begat the Big 12 beginnings.

• The somewhat irrational fear of certain Big 12 members related to the mildly pertinent Longhorn Network begat expansion for the SEC (A&M and Missouri), the Big Ten (Nebraska) and Pac-12 (Colorado).

• The Big 12 begat the invasion of non-Power 5 conferences with West Virginia and TCU and then ACC expansion "begated" by all the previous "begatation."

• That move put the Big Ten in an arms race, which begat its own enlargement a second time (USC and UCLA).

• That Big Ten expansion, coupled with the popular and wildly profitable SEC Network (and a desire to expand its own appeal) begat the move of Oklahoma and Texas to the east.

• And then there is the giant "cluster-mess" that is the current Pac-12 situation … which will begat whatever is left to be begotten.

This is where we find ourselves in the autumn of 2023 … perhaps the autumn of the college football enterprise we know it. Of course, another word for autumn is fall.
Yes, history can and likely will repeat itself.

With a series of phone calls from a hotel room at a DFW Airport hotel, it was soon-to-be-fired Big 12 commissioner Dan Beebe who literally saved the Big 12 from extinction in the early begatting.

The Pac-12 as we know it will not survive, unless someone has Beebe on speed dial — or someone determines Oregon State and Washington State are just as worthy as Vanderbilt and Northwestern and Boston College.

College football needs the west coast — north to south and everything in between. It needs the heartland from the corn fields to the wheat fields to the ranch land to the oil fields. It needs the east coast from the Cape to the 'Canes. It needs what lies between New Orleans and Atlanta. It needs the Blue Ridge Mountains to the Great Lakes. And it needs commonality, collegiality and purpose.

The Big Eight and then the Big 12 avoided the apparent fate of the Pac-12, which appears to be going the way of the Southwest Conference. Chuck Neinas and Carl James provided leadership that looked at the big picture and knew the importance of loyalty, friendship, collegiality and prudence. They knew what was good coast-to-coast would be good for the industry. It seems like only yesterday the College Football Playoff was held hostage by the demands of the Rose Bowl for the guaranteed presence of Big Ten and Pac-12 teams in the "Granddaddy of them All."

Sorry, PaPa, you are a victim like so many others.

Sometime in the future, perhaps two or three generations down the road, in a bar at a fancy resort location, there will be a couple of commissioners sipping an adult beverage, and they will be talking about how nice it would be to have some eight-to-ten team conferences bound by geographical interest playing round-robin competition and determining champions. Perhaps a group of institutions of higher learning in the Northeast could form a conference; and there could be another along the East Coast, one league in the Southeast, one in the Southwest, one conference in the Upper Midwest, one in the Plains states, one in the mountain states and one along the West Coast.

If only Speegle had been a better football coach, perhaps he and Chuck Neinas wouldn't have been commissioner colleagues. They wouldn't have been commissioner brothers. Neinas would not have felt the need to approach the SWC, and he could have added Arkansas to the Big Eight membership roster.

Maybe, just maybe, if Cliff Speegle had more coaching success, the future landscape of college football would make much more sense than what the future became and holds.

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Tim Allen spent 45 years in college athletics. A Kansas State alum, he was assistant sports information director in Manhattan during his junior and senior years before being named assistant SID at Oklahoma State in 1978. He spent five years in Stillwater before joining the Big Eight Conference (and then the Big 12) where he eventually became a senior associate commissioner.

Oklahoma State University Athletics

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