While nothing has been confirmed, multiple reporters are saying this is not just a wild message board rumor.
If you thought today was just going to be a regular summer Thursday for college sports, well you thought wrong. First reported by Jon Wilner of Pac-12 Hotline, and later followed up with a report from The Athletic’s Nicole Auerbach, apparently UCLA and Southern Cal are planning to leave the Pac-12 for the Big Ten as early as 2024.
Source: USC and UCLA are planning to leave for the Big Ten as early as 2024. Move *has not been finalized* at the highest levels of power.
— Jon Wilner (@wilnerhotline) June 30, 2022
Now, it is certainly worth noting that Wilner goes on to say that this move has NOT been “finalized at the highest levels of power,” but the fact that it is out there now means it has some legs as a rumor.
According to The Athletic’s Bruce Feldman ($), the two California schools were the ones to reach out to the Big Ten about the potential seismic reshuffling of schools in college sports.
I have seen varying accounts of college sports people who think this would be cool and probably an equal amount of people who thinks this would be, decidedly, uncool. I, for right now, think it would be pretty hilarious and want to see it happen just for the pure chaos of it all…but I’ll probably eventually come down on the side of this being “uncool” because, like, California ain’t Big Ten, Paaawwwwwwl!
We will update this post as more news becomes available.