Pac-12 announces expansion to four new schools

Sept. 13, 2024, 9:22 a.m.

The Pac-12 rebuild has officially begun.

Early Thursday morning, Pac-12 announced that four new schools — Boise State, Fresno State, San Diego State and Colorado State — would be joining the conference. This comes after 10 members of the Pac-12, including Stanford, left the conference in 2022 and 2023, with only Oregon State (OSU) and Washington State (OSU) remaining.

The newly invited schools, currently members of the Mountain West Conference, are set to join Pac-12 beginning July 1, 2026. Due to the terms of the scheduling alliance, the Pac-12 will pay the Mountain West $43 million in poaching fees. In addition, the conference is expected to help each institution pay a $18-million fee for departing the Mountain West. The conference is expected to pay these fees in part due to a legal settlement that OSU and WSU won against the ten departing institutions.

The six Pac-12 schools will now look to find at least two more candidates for expansion. NCAA bylaws state that FBS conferences must have at least eight members, with a two year grace period to get back to the minimum in the case of departures. This grace period ends in 2026 for the Pac-12.

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