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The Pac-12's future remains an ongoing issue still being figured out, but many of its former members will still reap some of the conference benefits from the NCAA's bowl system.
Per Brett McMurphy of the Action Network, the 10 schools that are leaving the Pac-12 starting with the 2024 football season are "likely" to still play in bowl games affiliated with the conference.
One source told McMurphy this is the "most workable" of the not-great options available to the stakeholders involved in the bowl games until the new bowl contracts begin in 2026.
"Out of a series of not-great options, the most workable—short of blowing up the bowl system and the (35 non-playoff) bowl contracts—is to have the former Pac-12 schools sent to Pac-12 bowls for two more years," the source told McMurphy.
According to McMurphy, the former Pac-12 bowl-eligible teams will be considered as part of the conference's bowl pool after the 12-team College Football Playoff field is announced.
This scenario does lead to more questions about how teams will be selected, with McMurphy noting it won't necessarily be based on conference records:
"One possibility would be allowing the bowls to pick a bowl-eligible team based on the bowl's selection order without regard to the win-loss records, sources said. That could allow a Pac-12 bowl to select a 7-5 current or former Pac-12 team over a 10-2 team. Current bowl contracts with conferences don't allow bowls to skip over teams in the selection process with at least two fewer wins."
There is also the danger of pairing teams from the same conference against each other in a bowl game.
The six bowl games with Pac-12 affiliations for the next two years are the Alamo, Vegas, Holiday, Sun, LA and Independence. The Rose Bowl lost its conference affiliations with the Pac-12 and Big Ten when it was added to the College Football Playoff rotation.
Four of those bowl games have ties to the Pac-12 and one of the conferences adding a former Pac-12 school. The Holiday Bowl is an ACC-Pac-12 matchup. The Las Vegas Bowl is an SEC-Pac-12 matchup. The Alamo Bowl is a Big 12-Pac-12 matchup. The Sun Bowl traditionally pits a Pac-12 team against an ACC team.
Mcmurphy noted the other bowl games—LA and Independence—don't have "any potential conflicts regarding selecting former Pac-12 schools because they feature conferences that did not add Pac-12 schools."
Oregon State and Washington State are the only schools that will remain in the Pac-12 starting with the 2024-25 academic year. Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado and Utah are set to join the Big 12. UCLA, Oregon, USC and Washington will move to the Big Ten.
The ACC is set to add California and Stanford.
The Athletic's Chris Vannini noted NCAA bylaws allow conferences a two-year grace period to get back to a minimum of eight members in the event of departures.
Oregon State athletic director Scott Barnes told Vannini the school's first priority is to join an existing power conference, but the second option "is to build back a power conference with the Pac-12 banner."
The Mountain West conference announced a football scheduling agreement with Oregon State and Washington in December. The two schools have announced their list of opponents for the 2024 season, but dates for games against Mountain West programs have yet to be finalized.
