The Big 12 Conference will officially expand on July 1, 2023.
Houston, Cincinnati and Central Florida have reached an exit agreement with their current league, the American Athletic Conference, and will be members of the Big 12 beginning with the 2023 football season.
Also joining the Big 12 by then will be Brigham Young, which operates as an independent in football.
As of now, the conference membership for the 2023-24 and 2024-25 school years will stand at 14. Texas and Oklahoma have announced they’re joining the SEC. But the schools haven’t indicated they’ll join earlier than the duration of the Big 12’s current media rights deals, which run for three more years.
To be determined: Will expanded Big 12 football return to divisional play? The league was separated by North and South divisions from its inception in 1996 until 2010.
When the Big 12 dropped to 10 members with the departures of Missouri, Nebraska, Colorado and Texas A&M, along with the additions of West Virginia and TCU, it scrapped divisions and the top two teams in the league football standings played for the conference championship.
The Big 12 is the only Power 5 conference to play every league opponent. That will change with expansion, and the league must come up with a regular-season scheduling formula.
Basketball is planning to remain at 18 games, according to reports. As a 14-team league, schools would play five teams twice and eight teams once.
The American will replace the three schools with Charlotte, Florida Atlantic, North Texas, Rice, Texas-San Antonio and UAB, who were officially accepted as new AAC members last fall. Those six schools are planning to begin AAC competition in the fall of 2023, The Athletic reported.
This story was originally published June 10, 2022 10:50 AM.