BIG-TIME MOVE
How Cincinnati became latest member of Big 12
It felt like it took a lifetime, and in many respects it did. But in actuality, it took about 50 days for the University of Cincinnati to become the newest member of the Big 12 Conference and join the Power Five.
After the school accepted the Big 12's invitation to join the conference, UC President Neville G. Pinto and Big 12 Commissioner Bob Bowlsby both wanted to make sure athletic director John Cunningham received all of the credit for building the bridge between UC and the school's new home conference.
Cunningham, who was hired in December 2019, has had perhaps the most eventful, pressure-packed first two years on the job of any athletic director on record.
From eliminating the UC men's soccer program to leading the athletic department through a global pandemic, and firing one men's basketball coach and hiring another, then sifting through a lawsuit brought by the fired coach, it's been a nonstop thrill ride for Cunningham,
“It's been wild, but a lot of fun, and from Day 1 this is where we wanted to be,” Cunningham said.
On July 26, Texas and Oklahoma notified the Big 12 that they will not be renewing their grants of media rights following expiration in 2025. It was the first signal that the two schools were leaving the Big 12 and joining the Southeastern Conference.
That announcement caused Cunningham to point his attention toward getting into a Power Five conference.
“One of the things I've always talked about was if and when there was an opportunity, we were going to be ready,” he said.
In the midst of the craziness of the past two years, Cunningham created what he called a “if and when” committee. The No. 1 task of the group was to discuss conference realignment and UC'S options within it.
“When the churn of conference realignment started with Oklahoma and Texas not extending their grant of rights, then all of a sudden that door opened,” Cunningham said. “I immediately had a conversation with president
Pinto and we agreed we were going to be aggressive. We were going to be respectful of our American (Athletic) Conference partnership, but we were going to be very aggressive.”
Pinto, Cunningham and the “if and when” committee began making phone calls. One of those calls was to Bowlsby.
“I called him, and I remember being a little surprised he picked up,” Cunningham said. “We had a really good conversation.”
After a couple of weeks went by, Bowlsby reached back out to Cunningham.
“We had more conversations,” Cunningham said. “We eventually made our way down to see him in Dallas and had a really good sit-down with him. Coming out of that meeting in Dallas, I felt very strongly that this was a real possibility, and this was probably going to happen.”
The AAC has an exit fee of $10 million and requires its members to give a 27month notice of departure. If a school leaves before 27 months, the exit fee increases to a negotiated amount.
So UC, along with fellow new Big 12 member institutions Central Florida, Houston and Brigham Young, won't be official members until July 2024.
“We're contractually obligated to the American (Athletic) Conference. We would not start (in the Big 12) no earlier than July 1, 2024,” Cunningham said. “Now, I say that – if conversations and arrangements are made that would be different than that, then those are going to take place between the American (Athletic) Conference schools that are leaving and the conference office. We'll follow our contractual obligations with the conference.”
It remains unclear how much Cincinnati will receive for an initial annual payout from the Big 12. Bowlsby said the Big 12 will enter television rights negotiations with FOX and ESPN in March 2024.
The conference's members each received about $40 million in TV revenue last year.
Bowlsby said “in all likelihood” the Big 12 will compete in football under two divisions.
“We'll need to try and find ways to divide them as competitively as we can,” he said. “We also are going to try and respect traditional rivals and some of those types of things. We will be diving into those things Monday morning.”
As of now, Texas and Oklahoma aren't scheduled to join the SEC until July 2025.
“It’s been wild, but a lot of fun, and from Day 1 this is where we wanted to be.”
John Cunningham Cincinnati athletic director