With recent turnover in the Univ. of Texas athletic department and its football team "in the dumps," Univ. of Oklahoma President David Boren might be "laying the groundwork for an Oklahoma move to the Big Ten or SEC," according to Kevin Sherrington of the DALLAS MORNING NEWS. Boren recently laid out a plan for the Big 12 to compete with the other Power 5 conferences, and Sherrington asks, "Is Boren trying to grab more power? ... Does he really believe Texas could be pressured into giving up on the Longhorn Network and expansion would put the Big 12 on the same financial footing as the SEC and Big Ten? ... I don't see anything changing with the LHN" (DALLAS MORNING NEWS, 1/19). In Austin, Kirk Bohls noted Boren, who "in some circles is Mr. Filibuster, even called the Big 12 a 'little brother'" to the other Power 5 conferences, which "isn’t smart or even true." The conference's basketball programs are "kicking butt and taking names." But "more important, the league needs Texas to be Texas-good again." That would be "the biggest boon." Bohls: "Personally, I just don’t get Boren’s insatiable need for expansion." Boren is "still peeved the Big 12 didn’t reach out to Louisville in the last round of expansion," which was a "clear mistake." Bohls: "I commend Boren for thinking out of the box and out of the conference." But one prominent Big 12 AD said, "Stature isn’t solely defined by numbers. It’s defined by success" (AUSTIN AMERICAN-STATESMAN, 1/17).
