Big 12 Football: Top Returning Players

Here is my early early list for Top 15 Players returning to the Big 12 Conference:

Ryan Broyles, WR Oklahoma

Nate Solder, LT Colorado
DeMarco Murray, RB Oklahoma

Robert Griffin III, QB Baylor

Alexander Robinson, RB Iowa State

Sam Acho, DT Texas

Prince Amukamara, CB Nebraska
Curtis Brown, CB Texas

Aldon Smith, DE Missouri

Taylor Potts, QB Texas Tech

Landry Jones, QB Oklahoma

Daniel Thomas, RB Kansas State

Travis Lewis, LB Oklahoma
Blaine Gabbert, QB Missouri

Blake Giddeon, S Texas

The New Big 12

Colorado and Nebraska are no longer in the Big 12. Colorado has left to join the Pac 10 while Nebraska has joined the Big 10. The remaining Big 12 schools met and decided to stay in the Big 12, realigning to 10 teams. That leaves the following teams: Iowa State, Kansas State, Kansas, Missouri, Baylor, Oklahoma State, Oklahoma, Texas, Texas Tech, and Texas A&M. This now means the Big 12 will not have any Championship game, as you need 12 teams. Nebraska and Colorado feel there is more money to be made playing in those conferences (television rights) than staying in the Big 12. The Big 10 will now have to decide to split the conference up in two divisions, with 6 being in each conference.

Big 12 Football will never be the same

You would have to be living under a rock to not know that the Big 12 Football conference will never be the same. Nebraska is officially heading to the Big Ten Conference and the University of Colorado announced it is joining the Pac-10 Conference.

So will the Big 12 be the “Big 10?” Or will the Pac 10 lure more of our teams away and dissolve the Big 12 all together? It will be an interesting next couple of weeks for Big 12 Football fans – STAY TUNED!

Big 12 Football Standings: 2010 Preview

I was digging around online to see what people are predicting for the Big 12 Conference 2010 football season and I found a pair of polls I want to share with the readers of my Big 12 football blog.

Big 12 North Fan Poll
Who will win the Big 12 North Division? [539 votes total]
Nebraska (329) 61%
Missouri (89) 17%
Kansas St. (66) 12%
Iowa St. (29) 5%
Kansas (14) 3%
Colorado (12) 2%

I am sure the high Nebraska number is due to their incredibly loyal (and huge) fan base and the fact that they were one second away from beating Texas in last years championship game.

Big 12 South Fan Poll
Who will win the Big 12 South Division? [525 votes total]
Texas (173) 33%
Oklahoma (155) 30%
Texas A&M (91) 17%
Texas Tech (62) 12%
Okla. St. (26) 5%
Baylor (18) 3%

No surprise here really since Oklahoma and Texas have won the last SIX Championship games, but the Longhorns have said goodbye to Colt McCoy and the Sooners will be without Sam Bradford, so maybe a sleeper Big 12 team could surprise us in 2010!

Stay Tuned!

Niles Paul Ticketed with Minor

The Cornhuskers top receiver, Niles Paul, was ticketed with his second alcohol possession related incident during his career at Nebraska. Paul was also ticketed for publicly urinating on campus. Paul's blood alchohol level was .104, over ten times the legal limit. He pleaded guilty to drinking as a minor and for his reckless driving earlier in the year. Head coach Bo Pelini stated that the matter is already being dealt with internally and Paul already was forced to sit out many of the Spring practices for his reckless driving incident.

KU Ticket Scandal Will Help Other Schools

Five athletic officials at Kansas University had been profiting off football and basketball tickets from 2005-2009. All of those officials have been fired and the school has lost an estimated cost of 1 million dollars. The officials would conspire to get the tickets for football games and the sold out Allen Fieldhouse for basketball games and then pocket the money for themselves. The scam involved nearly 20,000 tickets all together over that time period. Officials at Kansas have said they have heard from a multitude of sports organizations asking them for help so that they too can prevent this from happening. Some in Lawrence are calling for Lew Perkins, the athletic director at KU, to be fired.