Sources: Oregon, Washington to Join Big Ten, Leave Pac-12 Brett McMurphy Updated: Aug 04, 2023, 12:41 PM EDT

The Big Ten is getting even bigger with Oregon and Washington becoming the latest schools to join the conference from the Pac-12 starting in 2024, sources told Action Network.

The departure of the Ducks and Huskies increases the number of schools leaving the Pac-12 in the past 13 months to five (UO, UW, Colorado, USC and UCLA) and could be the fatal blow to the Pac-12.

The Big Ten will grow to 18 members, the largest in college football history, and must decide whether to expand even further. The Big Ten is contemplating whether to stand at 18 or consider adding Stanford and Cal, or possibly any ACC schools that may leave, sources said.

Oregon and Washington will not immediately receive full shares in the Big Ten’s new media rights deal with FOX, CBS and NBC but will still make more than they would have by remaining in the Pac-12, sources said.

With additional schools leaving the Pac-12, the Mountain West would “be open” to adding remaining Pac-12 schools to the league, sources told Action Network.

The Mountain West currently has a linear television deal with FOX and CBS Sports Network with additional games on CBS through the 2025 season. Another possibility for the Mountain West, depending on how many schools are remaining in the Pac-12, could be a merger of some type between the two leagues, a source said.

Last August, Action Network reported Oregon and Washington met with Big Ten officials about potential membership. Oregon met with Big Ten officials in Chicago, while Washington met with Big Ten officials in New York, sources said.

Both schools had been “vetted and cleared” to join the Big Ten for more than a year if the financial details could be worked out between the schools, the Big Ten and the Big Ten’s television partners.

“There was no more research or information needed on Oregon and Washington,” Big Ten sources said Thursday. “We have everything we need.”

When former commissioner Kevin Warren left to become president and CEO of the Chicago Bears, the Big Ten momentarily paused the pursuit of any additional members. Even last month, new commissioner Tony Petitti said his direction from the Big Ten presidents was not to expand but to focus on the addition of USC and UCLA in 2024.

That quickly changed when Colorado left for the Big 12.

Even though the Big Ten started the Pac-12’s downfall by grabbing USC and UCLA last year, the league did not want “the Pac-12’s blood on its hands” by taking Oregon and Washington before any other members left, sources said.

However, with the departures of Arizona, Arizona State and Colorado, the Big Ten saw the opportunity to add the Ducks and Huskies without paying them full media shares since the Pac-12 is in “disarray,” sources said.

The Big Ten now must decide whether to stay at 18 schools or expand further. The league’s options are adding Stanford and Cal or waiting to see if any schools become available from the ACC, such as Florida State, Clemson, Miami or North Carolina.

Notre Dame is the Big Ten’s top expansion candidate, but the Irish have given no indication they want to give up their independent status.

Last week, Florida State’s president Richard McCullough and the school’s trustees were clear their days in the ACC were limited.

“We are not satisfied with our current situation,” McCullough said in the Board of Trustees meeting. “We love the ACC. Our goal is to stay in the ACC, but to stay in the ACC under the current (media rights) situation is hard for us to figure out how we remain competitive unless there is a major change in revenue distribution within the ACC.”

Added FSU trustee Drew Weatherford: “It's not a matter of if we leave (the ACC), but how and when we leave.”

Will Stein is off to a strong start in the 2025 cycle after landing the Southern California passer.

More at link.

One of the big stories coming into the Pac-12 football season is that 2023 will be the last season of the conference as we know it.

USC and UCLA made their plans public last year; they are headed to the Big Ten. But the future of the conference is in limbo now that Colorado has announced its plans to defect to the Big 12. It’s led to speculation about what some other schools will do. Will the Pac-12 survive? Will it add members? Will it disappear?

More at link.

The previous four teams (USC ,UU, UW , UCLA) are conference contenders, but a lack of defensive presence will ultimately keep Oregon from taking down the Pac-12.

Second-team All Pac-12 edge rusher Brandon Dorlus will continue to create Havoc, but a lack of pressure and efficiency from the 3-3-5 scheme of head coach Dan Lanning continues to be an issue for the Ducks.

Full article at link

Oregon women's basketball has added Swedish forward Filippa Tilliander to the roster before the 2023-24 season.

The Ducks have added some European flair to the 2023-24 roster with the addition of Swedish forward Filippa Tilliander. The school announced Tilliander's signing on Thursday a few weeks before the team is set to embark on its foreign tour to Greece.

More at link.

Dan Lanning and the University of Oregon have reportedly agreed to a contract extension

Bonny is not a Duck but this is scary nonetheless. Wish him a speedy recovery. Hope he can someday get back to the court.

The past week has seen the rollout of all player ratings in the newest version of the EA Sports stalwart game, ‘Madden 24.’ While it may not seem like ratings from a video game should usually be treated as a newsworthy event, the Madden ratings get treated differently, with NFL players often looking at the numbers they were assessed with and debating on if they are accurate or not.

Throughout the week we have kept tabs on the ratings for professional Oregon Ducks who are on a team going into fall camp. It’s given us a chance to laugh at Devon Allen’s remarkably inaccurate speed numbers and give props to Justin Herbert for being the highest-rated Duck in the game.

More at link.

No Deion Sanders at Pac-12 Media Day proves to be another loss for a league needing wins

LAS VEGAS — On Thursday afternoon in Nashville, an exceptionally tan Lane Kiffin took to the stage at SEC Media Days and did what Nick Saban and Kirby Smart usually refuse to do: he unleashed the flamethrower, calling the current state of NIL and the transfer portal in college football “a disaster.” In the ever-sanitized fired-up coach-speak existence of most media day events, it was some must-see TV.

Among the many things the Pac-12 is missing by Deion Sanders being unable to attend here in the historically hot summer in the desert, the theater of it all is chief among them. In a city that wants to reel in the best entertainers on the planet, that plasters their smiles on billboards and uploads them onto digital marquees around The Strip, Colorado’s first-year head coach would’ve been a nice little distraction for a conference seemingly always in flux.

At 1:01 p.m. Mountain Time on Wednesday afternoon, Sanders’ personal YouTube channel, Thee Pregame Show, posted a two-and-a-half minute long video of Sanders announcing he wasn’t going to Pac-12 Media Day due to more blood clots needing to be removed from his thigh and a follow-up surgery on his left foot that has already had two toes amputated. Sanders was seated on a training table inside the Colorado football facility explaining the timing.

“This is how the devil works: He thinks if he stops my mobility, he can stop my ability,” Sanders said.

A day before Pac-12 Media Day kicked off inside Resorts World Las Vegas on Friday morning, a Deadspin writer penned a column rousing a secular portion of college football circles. There was some predictable fury, pointing to the conference boasting the reigning Heisman Trophy winner and other good quarterbacks. The headline: “Without Deion Sanders in attendance, Pac-12 Media Day might as well pack it up and go home.”

It’s both right and wrong. Media days exist for soundbites, where writers and those on radio row alike pray for someone to say anything interesting. Media days exist for outsized personas like Deion Sanders.

Had he been here, he would’ve made heads turn on the third-floor ballroom. There would’ve been a crowd of cameras. Reporters would’ve tailed him about, getting a glance at what he might do next. You would’ve heard that booming voice echo. He might’ve even worn the cowboy hat. Some might perceive all those things as shallow, as easy entertainment, something that cannot be replicated by any other coach in the conference (or the country for that matter). Hey, it is Vegas.

From that reality alone, not having Sanders center-stage here hurts. The Pac-12 needs public perception wins where it can get them.

Having Sanders’ multi-million dollar grin owning an auditorium, going off the cuff and presumably leading this evening’s “SportsCenter” with some Sanders-esque coach-preach would’ve been a victory. Right now, the college football world and fans of the soon-to-be 10 remaining institutions — once USC and UCLA bolt — await a media rights deal that has still yet to be struck.

Colorado defensive coordinator Charles Kelly, who came in place of Sanders, said he texted Sanders throughout the day Friday to check in on him. During Kelly’s time on the main stage late Friday afternoon, the media seating was fairly sparse. Had Sanders been able to attend, it presumably would’ve been a full house. Kelly addressed the absurd amount of roster turnover that has pitted Sanders in a war of words with some head coaches across the country, saying Sanders has always told the truth about how they planned on restructuring Colorado’s program. Some, like Utah coach Kyle Whittingham, are just fascinated to see how the experiment turns out.

“Coach Sanders has really shaken the tree there,” Whittingham said.

During his 45-minute window to kick off the morning, Pac-12 commissioner George Kliavkoff said this was the most anticipated conference media day ever before facing a peppering of questions regarding the perceived shakiness of the state of the conference and a lack of a 2024 TV deal with five weeks to go before the start of the 2023 college football season. While sharing the stage with Pac-12 executive associate commissioner Merton Hanks and Utah athletic director Mark Harlan, Kliavkoff ended up asking the last question of the allotted time.

He asked Hanks, who won a Super Bowl with Sanders with the 1994 San Francisco 49ers, what it was like to play with Prime Time. Hanks sported his giant, shiny Super Bowl ring as he held the Pac-12 mic.

“He’s always been the guy,” Hanks said. “So people who understand being the guy, there is a pressure that comes with being the guy that stays with you. He’s been able to achieve all along the way, whether it’s been as an athlete, as a coach, as a business individual. He’s going to raise the bar, and quite frankly, bring out the best in all of our coaches because you know you’re competing against a winner on the other side — make no mistake about that.”

When provided with a window to keep Coach Prime in the conversation, Pac-12’s commissioner did it.

And that’s how his time on stage ended. While Sanders was recovering from his surgical procedures back in Colorado, there were other members of the Sanders crew in Las Vegas. Son Shedeur Sanders, who transferred from Jackson State to Colorado and is the presumed starting quarterback for the Buffaloes this year, came alongside cornerback Travis Hunter. Deion Sanders Jr., who is part of the Sanders family content creation machine, maneuvered around the hotel with a camera capturing each stop.

Shedeur isn’t Prime level yet, but on stage there were shades of his dad in some of his answers.

“Long day,” he said. “We answered the same question probably like 30 times.”

When Ashley Adamson of the Pac-12 Network asked if he saved his best answers for the main stage session, Shedeur smiled just like his old man: “I know you’ve got something cooking.”

Oregon baseball coach Mark Wasikowski and track coach Jerry Schumaker committed UO’s two self-reported NCAA secondary violations in 2022-23.It was the fewest secondary violations reported by UO over the last five years and both were recruiting related.

More at link.

Sabrina Ionescu record-shattering performance in a 3-point shooting contest caught the attention of Steph Curry.

Ionescu racked up 37 points in the second round during the WNBA All-Star Weekend last week, a WNBA record number of points in a single round. Ionescu made 25 of 27 shots – including 20 consecutive shots – during the contest. Ionescu’s point total also eclipsed Curry and Tyrese Haliburton’s NBA-record of 31 points in the contest during the NBA All-Star Weekend.

The New York Liberty and former Oregon star then jokingly challenged Curry to a 3-point shooting contest.

Film review of Bryant’s 2021 season at USC as starting wide receiver

Bryant was recruited to USC in the 2020 cycle as a high 4-star (.9766) in the 24/7 composite. The Trojans returned three of their four elite wide receivers from 2019 and the one they needed to replace was a tall outside receiver while Bryant is a 5’10” inside receiver, so he settled in for his true freshman year as a rotational inside guy and got the fifth most targets of the WRs. That season doesn’t count against his eligibility due to the covid holiday, and he took a redshirt in 2022, so he has three to play three remaining.

More at link (ATQ).

The historic arena came to be synonymous with UO, but what’s going on with it now?

If you’ve watched “Moneyball,” you know there’s a school of thought in professional baseball that uses player offensive statistics to try and put together winning teams. You don’t have to be Billy Bean (or Brad Pitt for that matter) to understand that - no matter if it’s baseball or softball - if more players get more hits, draw more walks or otherwise reach base more often, your team has a better chance of scoring runs and winning games.

During the 2023 Pac-12 season, Oregon improved across the board in key offensive statistics and this, combined with improvements in pitching and defense, allowed the Ducks to improve from a 10 - 14 Conference record in 2022 to

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Big Ten football fans might have a few more current Pac-12 teams to watch if recent conference realignment rumors are to be believed.

In 2024, the Big Ten will welcome two current Pac-12 teams to the league. It feels like it’s been a very long wait to see USC and UCLA join the B1G. If new rumors are accurate, it might not be that long before two more Pac-12 squads join the conference.

Paul Finebaum talked about what he thinks will continue to be a busy conference realignment season.

Rivalries take a lot of different forms in the world of college football. I could reasonably argue that the Oregon Ducks have a handful of rivals, and each answer is respectable.

If you’re talking about the team that Duck fans despise the most, it’s probably the Washington Huskies. The team that it hurts most to lose to is probably Oregon State. Off the field, when fighting for national recognition and, more recently, recruiting success, USC is Oregon’s biggest rival. If we’re talking about the team that has gotten in the Ducks’ way the most over the past half-decade, I’d say it’s the Utah Utes who are Oregon’s biggest foe.

The Ducks have many rivals in the Pac-12, and heading into our final year of the conference as we know it before USC and UCLA take off for the Big Ten, we wanted to answer the question once and for all…

Who is Oregon’s biggest rival?

He's a nightmare for opponents, a B student who volunteers in the community, and a fast, physical disruptor at linebacker and defensive end. At Cherry Creek High School in Green Valley Ranch, Colorado, Oregon freshman Blake Purchase won four straight 5A state championships. As a senior, they named him Colorado Gatorade Player of the Year.

More at link.

Carly Eidam is seen in an undated selfie she took at the grave of her brother, former Oregon Ducks tight end Spencer Webb. A year after Webb's death, Eidam continues to search for items that belonged to her brother and do what she can to forge any relationship she still can, even in his memory.

Continued in link.

It all starts with the quarterback, and unless something abnormal takes place, it usually ends with the quarterback as well. The 2023 season in the Pac-12 is going to be defined by quarterback play, with some of the best passers in the nation getting set out west to try and end the conference drought in the College Football Playoff.

There are three sure-fire Heisman Trophy contenders, with a fourth or fifth hanging around the fringes. There are offensive masterminds scattered throughout the landscape ready to dial up shots down the field. There’s a chance that, in the final year of the Pac-12 as we know it, we are going to see a better display of quarterback play than we ever have before.

So who are the guys that you need to pay attention to and keep on your radar as we get set for fall camp to begin in a couple of weeks? Here’s who we are looking at:

Continued in link

CDL to bring Nixs and Bassa

My favorite part is the person that claims that Mario was brought for his gameday/ on- the- field capabilities and not his ability to bring in big time cruits.

Nice to see the O in there with the premium brands in college football for these recruits. Truly a national program.

Haven't heard much about him on the boards. Looks to be a Utah/U$C thing.

Hythloday1's film review of OL Transfer Nishad Strother’s three seasons as a starting guard at East Carolina before transferring to Oregon.

“They see me playing inside linebacker and want to use me how they used Noah Sewell. It’s called their ‘money’ backer and I like the fit a lot. You get to move around, play in space, blitz, you’re not just sitting inside the box so I like the fit a lot.”

Oregon landed a commitment from 4-star linebacker Kamar Mothudi. The 6-foot-3, 215-pound Los Alamitos (Calif.) standout is the No. 246 overall prospect in the ’24 class and the No. 25 linebacker.

Bulldogs and Ducks in it for J.Williams

Coach Eric Boyles breakdown of Will Stein's schemes. This is one of a series of articles on Fishduck by Boyles about Stein's Oregon offence.

Hythloday1's fantastic breakdown of the 2023 football roster from ATQ (it's a website).