(Original Caption) Team group shot of the UCLA University players after they won the NCAA Title beating Dayton. Lew Alcindor shown in center rear and coach John Wooden is on right rear.
The demise of the Pac-12 Conference has divided college sports fans into two camps. Traditionalists have lamented the death of a storied league that produced a wealth of great players, great coaches, great games and the most national championships of any college conference across all sports.
The younger set has embraced the modern dynamics of college sports which include NILs, a more lenient transfer portal and the pursuit of mega media-rights deals to keep up with the Joneses.
While neither side will admit it, both sides are right. The truth is rarely black and white. It’s almost always nuanced shades of gray.
It’s true that the Big 12 as a football conference is nowhere near as appealing after losing Oklahoma’s historic success and Texas’ mega brand to the SEC. TCU has had some recent success, but the Big 12 is a distant third to the SEC and Big Ten in strength of teams and strength of interest. Adding Colorado, Arizona, Arizona State and Utah isn’t going to remedy that.
It’s also true that the Big 12 as a men’s college basketball conference is going to be something to behold. Kansas, Houston, Arizona, Baylor, Texas and Kansas State make for a formidable lineup. Now imagine if the rumored pursuit of Gonzaga and UConn bears fruit.
It’s true that the Big 12 road trips won’t be nearly as appealing as the Pac-12. In terms of city attractions, you simply can’t lump Waco, Texas; Ames, Iowa; Stillwater, Oklahoma; and Lubbock, Texas in the same conversation as Los Angeles, the Bay Area, Seattle or Eugene, Oregon. Adding Boulder, Colorado and Tempe/Phoenix will be a major upgrade for the conference.
On the flip side, the Big 12 offers a chance to forge new rivalries. And more notably, it offers Pac-12 fans a glimpse of what real fan support and game-day atmosphere looks like. While the Big 12 may never match the picturesque settings of the Rose Bowl, Strawberry Canyon, Autzen Stadium and Husky Stadium, the Pac-12 never had much vibe on college football game days. The Big 12 brings it in rabid force.
While the Pac-12 has an incredible history of success in the two big revenue sports, it hasn’t won a men’s basketball national championship this millennium (the Big 12 has won two of the past three), and it hasn’t won a college football national championship since 2003.
While it’s true that the Big 12’s media rights deal will offer more money than Colorado, Arizona, Arizona State and Utah were ever going to get from Apple’s risky proposal, conference realignment has also created a very real hardship on displaced student-athletes that the football-and-basketball-are-all-that-matters crowd simply ignores.
You can debate the merits and drawbacks of this move all day, with valid points on either side. The bottom line — as much maligned ASU president Michael Crow outlined in this Q&A — is this: Once Oregon and Washington opted for greener pastures in the Big Ten, the Pac-12 was no longer viable. This move had to happen. It was about survival.
There’s a reason the Big Ten had little interest in the four schools that just moved to the Big 12, however. Like it or not, their brands are not as attractive as USC, UCLA, Washington and Oregon. Colorado, Arizona, Arizona State and Utah had to make this move, or risk getting left behind like Stanford, Cal, Washington State and Oregon State. The shake-up unwittingly exposed the caste system of college athletics; both within the Pac-12 and within the greater national landscape. Now that this system rules college athletics, you should be worried about what it means for the long-term viability of programs that do not tickle ESPN’s or Fox’s fancy.
The Pac was officially born in 1968 with eight charter members: USC, UCLA, Stanford, Cal, Oregon, Oregon State, Washington and Washington State. Ten years later, Arizona and Arizona State joined the conference. In 2011, after a failed pursuit of Texas and Oklahoma, Utah and Colorado joined the conference two years after Larry Scott was named Pac-10 commissioner. There was optimism that the Pac was positioned to maintain its perch as one of the nation’s premier conferences, but the next decade produced a series of bad internal decisions, coupled with the aforementioned trio of transformative changes on the college athletics landscape.
With the Pac-12 preparing for its final season of existence as we know it, let’s take a look back at an era when money didn’t rule every decision; a time when the Pac-12, Pac-10 and Pac-8 were producing stars and memories with every passing season.
Whether it was John Wooden’s UCLA Bruins, John McKay’s USC football teams, Linda Vollstedt’s ASU women’s golf teams, Rod Dedeaux’s USC baseball teams or Mike Candrea’s Arizona softball teams, the Pac has produced some genuine dynasties.
It’s impossible to name every great player or coach in the conference’s history. We won’t even try. Here’s a sampling of some of the greats from the football field, basketball courts, ball fields and the so-called Olympic sports. For purposes of these lists, we are only including names from 1968 on when the Pac was officially formed.
Pac-12 football greats
QBs: Troy Aikman, UCLA; Aaron Rodgers, Cal; Carson Palmer, USC; John Elway, Stanford; Jake Plummer, ASU; Dan Fouts, Oregon. RBs: O.J. Simpson, USC: Marcus Allen, USC; Reggie Bush, USC; Charles White, USC: Steven Jackson, Oregon State; Christian McCaffrey, Stanford. WRs/TEs: John Jefferson, ASU; Lynn Swann, USC: Keyshawn Johnson, USC: James Lofton, Stanford; Chad Johnson, Oregon State; Tony Gonzalez, Cal; Rob Gronkowski, Arizona. O/D-Linemen: Jonathan Ogden, UCLA; Anthony Munoz, USC: Terrell Suggs, ASU; Steve Emtman, Washington; Randall McDaniel, ASU; Derrick Rodgers, ASU LBs: Junior Seau, USC; Tedy Bruschi, Arizona, Pat Tillman, ASU, Rey Maualuga, USC. DBs: Ronnie Lott, USC; Troy Polamalu, USC, John Lynch, Stanford; Kenny Easley, UCLA
Pac-12 basketball greats
Lew Alcindor, UCLA
Bill Walton, UCLA
Gary Payton, Oregon State
Jason Kidd, Cal
Mike Bibby, Arizona
James Harden, ASU
Kevin Johnson, Cal
Marques Johnson, UCLA
Sean Elliott, Arizona
Paul Westphal, USC
Reggie Miller, UCLA
Candice Wiggins, Stanford
Lisa Leslie, USC:
Kelsey Plum, Washington
Cheryl Miller, USC
Sabrina Ionescu, Oregon
Cynthia Cooper, USC
Pac-12 baseball/softball greats
Jenny Finch, Arizona softball
Lisa Fernandez, UCLA softball
Rachel Garcia, UCLA softball
Kaitlin Cochran, ASU softball
AJ Hinch, Stanford baseball
Reggie Jackson, ASU baseball
Mark McGwire, USC baseball
John Olerud, Washington State baseball
Dustin Pedroia, ASU baseball
Barry Bonds, ASU baseball
Randy Johnson, USC baseball
Jack McDowell, Stanford baseball
Mike Mussina, Stanford baseball
Mark Prior, USC baseball
Pac-12Olympic sportgreats
Matt Biondi, Cal swimming
Henry Rono, Washington State track & field/cross country
Steve Prefontaine, Oregon track & field
Dwight Stones, UCLA track & field
Jackie Joyner-Kersee, UCLA track & field
Florence Griffith-Joyner, UCLA track & field
Phil Mickelson, ASU golf
Tiger Woods, Stanford golf
Annika Sörenstam, Arizona golf
Logan Tom, Stanford volleyball
Pac-12coaching greats
John Wooden, UCLA men’s basketball
Tara VanDerveer, Stanford women’s basketball
Lute Olson, Arizona men’s basketball
Pete Carroll, USC football
John McKay, USC football
Rod Dedeaux, USC baseball
Mike Candrea, Arizona softball
Sharron Backus, UCLA softball
David Durden, Cal men’s swimming
Skip Kenney, Stanford men’s swimming
Richard Quick, Stanford women’s swimming
Don Shaw, Stanford volleyball
Andy Banachowski, UCLA volleyball
Top photo of one of UCLA’s 10 national championship men’s basketball teams under John Wooden courtesy of Getty Images.
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