How have football programs fared after leaving or joining the Big 12? A guest analysis

With Texas and Oklahoma poised to depart the Big 12 in 2025 and BYU, Cincinnati, Houston and UCF joining the conference next year, it’s reasonable to wonder whether being in the Big 12 helps or hurts a football team’s national profile.

Sure, teams shift conferences more for money than for rankings, but rankings carry prestige ... and the money usually follows. Schools that jump to new leagues are typically seeking higher rankings and greater prestige for their athletic program — football in particular.

But does more money really help?

Analysis of AP Top 25 rankings for the past 34 years shows it’s not necessarily true that more money brings better performance. Sometimes it’s a relative wash and in other cases jumping conferences has appeared to damage departing teams and significantly aid newly arrived ones. The data below reveal the details.

The following table shows — for each team that is, or has been, in the Big 12 (or Big 8 prior to 1996) — the percentage of time each team spent in the AP Top 25 and its average ranking (when ranked).

The sections are colorized as:

Blue: teams ranked in the top 25 greater than 60% of the time period.

Green: teams ranked in the top 25 30-60% of the time period.

Yellow: teams ranked in the top 25 10-30% of the time period.

Red: teams ranked in the top 25 less than 10% of the time period.

The data show several cases of major impact in joining or leaving the conference ... and also some cases of little to no impact whatsoever.

In joining the Big 12, Baylor and Texas each saw significant gains in ranking performance, with Baylor moving from essentially unranked to ranked 22% of the time (with an average level of 11th). Texas moved from 38% to 67% in ranking percentage, and the Longhorns’ ranking average climbed from 17th to 12th.

TCU was a wash in ranking percentage but improved its average ranking from 15th to sixth. Texas Tech’s ranking performance was mostly a wash; only West Virginia and Texas A&M actually saw a reduction in their rankings performance after joining the Big 12.

Among departing schools, both Texas A&M and Missouri have been a wash, with relatively unchanged ranking percentages and only slight improvements in average rankings.

The big movers? Colorado and Nebraska. Upon leaving the Big 12, Colorado went from being ranked 44% of the time, with an average ranking of 10th, to being ranked just 8% of the time, with an average ranking of 17th.

Nebraska’s change in rankings performance is even more dramatic, declining from 79% ranked (with an average ranking of 12th while in the Big 12) to now being ranked just 9% of the time with an average ranking of 25th. That’s one ranking, of No. 25, in the past 11 years.

It’s fair to say that, while other factors have certainly played roles, too, leaving the Big 12 has not helped either of these teams.

Of the six teams that have entered the conference, two fared better after arrival, two fared worse and two were relatively unchanged. Of the four teams leaving the Big 12, two were unchanged and two did significantly worse.

So what will happen with BYU, Cincinnati, Houston, and Central Florida when they join the Big 12 in 2023, and how will Texas and Oklahoma fare after they depart in 2025?

Only time will tell if past is prologue.

Craig Price is an engineer who graduated Summa Cum Laude from Kansas State, then earned a Masters degree from Purdue and PhD from Stanford University.