No Big12 for BYU

Good news for the WCC. BYU will have to stay put, as the Big12 has decided against expansion after all:

http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/17818146/big-12-agree-new-members-stand-pat-10-schools

The Big12 ultimately didn't want to expand at all, as it is staying with 10 teams. But one of the specific arguments raised against BYU's candidacy was the school's open discrimination against LGBTQ students. I wasn't paying very close attention to the WCC at the time that BYU joined the league. Was this ever an issue for the WCC?

NoPoNeighbor wrote:Good news for the WCC. BYU will have to stay put, as the Big12 has decided against expansion after all:

http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/17818146/big-12-agree-new-members-stand-pat-10-schools

The Big12 ultimately didn't want to expand at all, as it is staying with 10 teams. But one of the specific arguments raised against BYU's candidacy was the school's open discrimination against LGBTQ students. I wasn't paying very close attention to the WCC at the time that BYU joined the league. Was this ever an issue for the WCC?

BYU's message board is full of complaints about this, but the fact of the matter is that the Big12 couldn't get the required eight votes on ANY candidate school. It's completely disingenuous for their fans to point at this as the only reason they didn't get invited - clearly, there are a lot more issues at play.

As for it being an issue when BYU joined the WCC, I definitely don't remember hearing about it. Though given that the WCC is full of religious schools, that's not entirely surprising. Also, it was a few years ago... awareness of and conversation about these issues has increased quite a bit since 2011.

I'm not fully informed on the position of all the WCC schools, but I'm pretty sure there's a pretty wide spectrum between schools like USF and SCU (very LGBT-friedly) and Pepperdine (very LGBT-unfriendly - in fact, two former women's basketball players successfully sued the school last year for discrimination and harassment by their coach and other staff members).

UP falls somewhere in the middle - it amended its non-discrimination policy in 2013 to include sexual orientation after a big student protest, which was a big step... in mindset at least, if not policy.

I've never thought that BYU was a good fit for the league. Their enrollment is three times larger than the next biggest school and 10 times that of UP.

That being said, it does raise the profile of the league and certainly increases revenue for the smaller schools.

BYU thinks they are too good for the WCC and wants to join a larger conference, but they still have yet to win the WCC since they joined in 2011.

It's funny... I'm reminded of when BYU was first rumored to be joining the WCC, and all you heard about from their fans was about how they would "dominate" the conference in all sports. Hasn't really worked out that way. Sure, they have been very competitive in all sports, but they definitely won a lot more championships (in all sports, not just basketball) in the MWC than in the WCC.

It's abundantly clear that BYU will jump ship from the WCC as soon as it seems they have a better option. I've come to be at peace with that, and I won't be shocked or saddened if and when they leave.

But really, it was an arranged marriage from the start: They are using us as a home for their non-football programs, and we are using them for the increased RPI/visibility they bring men's basketball. It's mutually beneficial in a business sense, I suppose, but it was never out of any mutual love for the conference or BYU.