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Brett Yormark talks Big 12 expansion, record revenues for schools at league meetings

With Texas and Oklahoma out in 2024, the league is reportedly targeting Colorado, Gonzaga and UConn, but the commissioner didn’t name any particular schools.

Texas Tech president Lawrence Schovanec, the chairman of the Big 12′s board of directors, took a moment Friday to reflect on last year’s search for a new conference commissioner.

Schovanec, speaking on Zoom from the Big 12′s meetings at the Greenbrier Resort in West Virginia, said conference leadership had multiple options. Most were “moderate reward, moderate risk,” as Schovanec described, but there was one with high-risk choice with high-reward potential.

The risky play was Brett Yormark, the former president of Roc Nation, whom the Big 12 eventually hired.

“I think the general sense,” Schovanec said Friday, speaking for the conference presidents and chancellors, “is that when we hired Brett Yormark, we hit the jackpot.”

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The bottom line helps with that assessment.

Yormark and the Big 12 announced that the 10 member schools — including Texas and Oklahoma, who will join the Southeastern Conference in 2024 — will receive a record $440 million distribution for the 2022-23 year.

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“We’re very proud, and that will continue to grow in the future,” Yormark said of the total.

Big 12 expansion

Speaking of the future: Yormark also touched briefly on potential expansion of the Big 12. The conference will welcome BYU, Central Florida, Cincinnati and Houston on July 1, but with the college football landscape constantly changing, Yormark said that further expansion is a focus, without naming any schools in particular.

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The Pac-12′s Four Corners schools — Colorado, Arizona, Arizona State and Utah — have been mentioned in previous media reports, with some saying talks are heating up with Colorado, which left the Big 12 in 2010.

Football is the driver, Yormark said, but the conference has an interest in enlarging its national basketball footprint, as well. UConn and Gonzaga, two basketball powerhouses from opposite sides of the country, have reportedly been mentioned as potential targets.

“We’re going to consider all options,” Yormark said. “As I said before, we do see the upside in basketball moving forward for all the right reasons. We think it’s undervalued and there’s a chance for us to double down as the No. 1 basketball conference in America.

“We have a plan, and as I said all along we have an appetite to be a national conference in our makeup from coast to coast.”

Here are some other topics Yormark discussed at the conclusion of Big 12 meetings on Friday.

New Big 12 branding

Yormark said the conference will be unveiling a “brand refresh” next year. What does that entail?

“Taking the current visual identity and contemporize it and modernize it,” he said. “We’re not changing our logo at this point in time, but how we do showcase it may be with different colors and and different applications.”

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Yormark added there won’t be a name change, either.

Big 12 in Mexico

Last month, reports said that the Big 12 was eyeing multi-year agreements to play regular season basketball and football games in Mexico. While Yormark said Friday that some details were premature, he did say that the conference’s international focus is on Mexico.

“We’re truly excited about our international plans and getting into that market sooner than later,” Yormark said.

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The NFL has played games in Mexico for years. The San Diego Padres and the San Francisco Giants played an MLB series in Mexico City this season.

An announcement on specific deals will come next week, according to Yormark.

Championship cities

Yormark said the conference discussed extending championship agreements with host cities, including Arlington for the conference’s football championship. Last year, the Big 12 and AT&T Stadium announced an extension through the 2025 season for the annual conference football championship. The Big 12 baseball tournament just wrapped up at Globe Life Field, where TCU emerged victorious. Basketball is hosted in Kansas City, while softball is hosted in Oklahoma City.

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“Very important for us on a go-forward basis to do that,” Yormark said.

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