With the departures of Nebraska and Colorado for the Big Ten and Pac-12, respectively, the Big 12’s 2011 season will end without a championship game for the first time since 1995.
In an effort to keep the conference’s name in the headlines in early December, at a time when the likes of the Big Ten, SEC and Pac-12 will be staging their own conference title games, the league has discussed moving a rivalry game or two to that first weekend of the last month of the year.
One discussed prominently has been the annual Bedlam showdown between Oklahoma and Oklahoma State. Another involves a pair of in-state rivals further south.
According to Kirk Bohls of the Austin American-Statesman, the annual Texas-Texas A&M rivalry game could be moved for “television considerations”. Both the schools would prefer to keep the current Thanksgiving holiday date, but would be amenable to be moving the game back a week if “it’s critical to the television deal.”
“It will be a one-shot deal,” the source told Bohls. “The athletic directors are going to have to put their heads together and figure this thing out.”
If the ‘Horns and Aggies agree to move their game to December, neither would play a game Thanksgiving weekend.
