re: UCF, Houston, BYU & Cincinnati to the big 12 will be official next week

That's got nothing to do with what ESPN and SEC wants. This is just Bowlsby trying to keep the conference viable longer because it's literally his job that's going away.

But if ESPN succeeds in leveraging them to release OU and Texas the other conferences have to expand to keep up, even though they dont want to.

This is chess. The Big12 teams not joining another conference is just the other three conferences counter move to stop the expansions.

The question is how do the other conferences stop the big12 from accepting the only media deal they're going to get from ESPN? If they dont accept the terms then ESPN doesnt give them air time until they do and there's no money.

It's ugly business, but it's just business.