No tooting until Longhorns join

Geez, if the NCAA had been in a really bad mood, the University of Colorado would be the Pac-10th this morning instead of the Pac-11th.

As it turned out, the football program at USCheat managed to avoid – but just barely – the death penalty on Thursday for Reggie Bush’s Undergraduate Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous, a bit of attention-sucking news that couldn’t have thrilled Pacific-10 Conference commissioner Larry Scott on the day he put match to fuse to blow up the feng shui of college athletics.

It didn’t quite make the Pac-10’s offer of membership to Colorado – and the Buffaloes’ acceptance – a footnote to the day. But certainly the NCAA actually dropping an anvil on the Trojans instead of, you know, Eastern Washington trumped any shock that might have attended the stodgy old Pac-10’s bold opening gambit in this game of conference realignment chess.

Besides, even if you think Thursday was something, hold on. Nebraska is expected to hooky bob onto the Big Ten today and then the demolition derby should begin in earnest.

The rumored scenarios include everything from a mass invitation to the Texas-Oklahoma axis to join the Pac-10 and thereby destroying the Big 12 to Texas A&M trying to cut its own deal with the Southeastern Conference to the Pac-10 having to retreat to a fallback position of just adding Utah – or even Kansas. Missouri will either be summoned to the Big Ten, or not. The Big East will hemorrhage some teams, or not. Notre Dame will become relevant again, or not.

Indeed, it was sadly comical on Thursday’s conference call to welcome Colorado that the Buffaloes – and president Bruce Benson and chancellor Philip DeStefano – already were virtual afterthoughts as Scott dodged question after question about what the Pac-10 will do next.

Even though it’s obvious: It will extend invitations to Texas, A&M, Texas Tech, Oklahoma and Oklahoma State, if it hasn’t already.

The more important question: What will it do – what will it have to do – to ensure that the Longhorns accept?

This is Scott’s big play, and if he doesn’t rake this pot then all those dollar signs dancing in Washington State athletic director Bill Moos’ head likely get chopped in half, at least.

And Thursday’s giddiness becomes, if not pointless, then certainly muted.

Moos has been thoroughly pragmatic in his approach to Pac-10 expansion – or annexation or rezoning, whatever you want to call it. It’s always been a show-him-the- money proposition. Initially, he was lukewarm about adding Colorado and Utah, however much he respected those schools and their programs, simply because he wasn’t convinced the markets they might bring to negotiations for the conference’s television deal next year would significantly benefit a bottom line to be divvied up 12 ways instead of 10.

However, when Scott and his consultants laid out the dollar possibilities of bringing aboard the Texas and Oklahoma schools – as much as $20 million annually to each conference school – he quickly reconsidered.

Duh. That’s roughly two-thirds of the Cougars’ annual operating budget.

He was also assuaged by the likely alignment of those schools with the two Arizona programs in an “east” division, allowing the Cougars to retain their ties to the old Pac-8 institutions and, every bit as important, the recruiting beds of California.

But no Horns, no help – or not as much, anyway.

If Texas doesn’t deliver A&M – and probably it does – then it at least delivers all the TV sets in Dallas and Houston. It also likely delivers Oklahoma, which surely doesn’t want to be separated from its regional rival.

But it is the one school with every option – attractive to the hungry hordes both to the north and east. It could also singlehandedly save the Big 12, even if Nebraska and Missouri bolt. Athletic director DeLoss Dodds has publicly announced his preference that the conference survives. In fact, he and Texas president William Powers who pushed for a deadline for conference schools to declare their intentions of staying or going.

Maybe that was sincere and maybe it was gamesmanship, but in any case the Longhorns are the fulcrum on which this deal teeters.

That said, you have to like Scott’s gamble – and the Pac-10’s new profile, though of course the conference did send come-hithers to both Colorado and Texas several years ago, and both passed.

“You can almost say that throughout the years, we’ve had a little touch of arrogance,” Moos said. “It’s been, ‘This is our party and our guest list and thanks for your interest, but you’re not on our dance card.’ But I like the aggressiveness. I like that we weren’t waiting for the other conferences to make moves. We knew what appealed to us and we went after it. I like that approach – whether we’re talking about the Pac-10 or Washington State.”

Aggression is one thing. Completion is another.