Was it TV, negotiating for the future? Seems awfully strange. Would love to know the back story.
I don’t believe there is any truth to OUT demanding not to play new members.
I really think it had to do with them trying to come to a buyout agreement for early exit and wanted to wrap both the schedule and early exit into a nice bow.
They probably gave themselves a hard deadline on the schedule to end of this month and failed to come to terms on the buyout.
Makes sense. Thanks
There could also have been some consternation from the other existing B12 teams that may have lost a home game with UT or OU, since those are big $$ games.
It’s possible.
Maybe OUT was trying to use the existing 8’s schedule demands as leverage for a cheaper buyout for early exit and they couldn’t come to terms so the new 4 gets to play the big 2.
Reading other schools reactions to the schedule, it was probably a really tough puzzle to put together, and several of the existing 8 had to sacrifice certain games among themselves to make it work, besides OU and UT.
Also heard on 365 that this is a ‘one-off’ schedule, and some of the games will not be return games ie: we play Baylor at their home this season but not guaranteed we will host Baylor the following season. A lot of variables for 2024, including negotiated early exit of OU and UT, long shot possibility of other schools joining the conference etc. Won’t be able to ‘stabilize’ the schedule until after 2025
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