AAC commissioner: 'It looks like' some members will leave for Big 12

It’s pretty much inevitable at this point, right?

The American Athletic Conference will probably lose at least one member to the Big 12. The majority of its 12 members have been connected to the Big 12’s new push for expansion in some capacity, and AAC commissioner Mike Aresco told Gridiron Now’s Tony Barnhart this week that the league has begun “contingency planning for just about every scenario.”

“I’ve been talking to the (athletic directors) and the president of the schools that might leave, and it looks like some of them will,” Aresco told Barnhart. “We’re talking to each other and trying to figure out the future. We expect everyone who leaves will leave on good terms.”

Houston, coming off a 13-1 season and Peach Bowl win over Florida State, is the school that is mentioned in expansion the most, but other AAC schools like Cincinnati, Memphis, UCF, USF, and UConn (along with independent BYU and the Mountain West’s Boise State and Colorado State) are in the mix, too. Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby said last week the league would consider adding two or even four new members.

The AAC is in limbo – or “shadow boxing,” as Aresco termed it – right now, but it appears the Big 12 could come to a consensus on members sooner rather than later. According to CBS Sports’ Dennis Dodd, the Big 12 “would prefer to wrap up the expansion process before the start of the 2016 football season.” The first game involving a Big 12 team is Sept. 2, when Baylor hosts Northwestern State.

That timeline isn’t concrete (this is the Big 12 we’re talking about, after all), but it leaves the conference with about a month to make up its mind. Dodd reported that the threat of expansion talk lingering over the season is a concern.

The Big 12 has other matters to handle, as well, with a championship game returning in 2017. How the two title game participants will be chosen (Bowlsby has said dividing members into two divisions, with winners squaring off for the championship, is most likely) is still up in the air. A swift expansion resolution – with new members possibly joining for 2017 – could factor into that decision.

Still, there are procedural and logistical things that could get in the way of a quick resolution. Per SB Nation, the AAC has a $10 million exit fee – and that’s when a school provides 27 months’ notice. Joining the Big 12 in time for the 2017 campaign clearly wouldn’t fit under that timeline, so a different (read: pricier) exit fee would have to be negotiated.

The exit fee isn’t quite as expensive for the Mountain West, but it’s not cheap either.

From SB Nation:

Per the conference’s bylaws, a school like Boise State or Colorado State can resign effective June 30 of each year, but must announce it “on or before” the previous June 30. For a program to resign in time to join the Big 12 for 2017-2018, it would need to notify the MWC by June 30, 2016 … which would be impossible, since it’s currently July.

So joining the Big 12 in 2017-2018 would mean penalties. Per MWC bylaws, that school would forfeit its final year of conference revenue and pay the MWC either $5 million dollars or double the amount of the final year’s revenue, whichever is greater.

If the Big 12 is going to figure this out before the season begins, it clearly has a lot of work to do.