USC is leaving the Pac-12, but it does need the Pac-12 to survive
The USC Trojans are leaving the Pac-12 behind in a year to go to the Big Ten … in football and basketball and several other sports.
However, water polo and beach volleyball won’t move to the Big Ten. A subset of USC athletes will need to have continuous competition with the Trojans’ longstanding West Coast neighbors in order for those programs to remain vibrant and robust.
Also consider the point that San Diego State joining the Pac-12 — which would obviously stabilize the conference and substantially cool down any talk of fragmentation and, ultimately, extinction — would keep a Southern California-based school in the Pac-12 and make sure that the Los Angeles-San Diego corridor would not become as isolated in the college sports realm.
One could raise the point that all of this would mean more competition for USC, as though it’s a bad thing. The other side of the coin is that competition keeps programs sharp and on their toes.
The nuance here: USC doesn’t need the Pac-12 to thrive and become hugely successful; it merely needs the Pac-12 to survive and retain a measure of structure and dependability which could benefit the Trojans on several levels, not the least of which is for Stanford and Cal to be regular nonconference football opponents if USC so chooses.
There’s more to discuss on these points at The Voice of College Football:
