How competitive will BYU be in its first season in the Big 12 Conference? Can the Cougars be a contender sooner rather than later? | Ben B. Braun, Deseret News
The college football landscape changed significantly more than a decade ago, when over a four-year period, 12 schools either moved up to a Power Five conference or changed power conferences.
The past decade-plus of results for those 12 programs paints a foreboding image of what may lie ahead for the next wave of teams that will be switching leagues at the Power Five level.
That will include BYU, UCF, Cincinnati and Houston moving up to the P5 level this Saturday when they officially join the Big 12 Conference.
Next year, bluebloods will be changing conferences — USC and UCLA are heading from the Pac-12 to the Big Ten, while Texas and Oklahoma switch from the Big 12 to the SEC.
The question for BYU is, how quickly will it acclimate to a heightened level of competition?
Will the Cougars — who are moving from being an independent program to a long-awaited spot in a power conference — be more like in-state rival Utah, or like Rutgers?
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Fielding a consistently competitive program in the Big 12 that will compete for a conference championship — and New Year’s Six bowl or College Football Playoff appearances — could prove to be a lesson in patience for BYU fans, as well as those from UCF, Houston and Cincinnati.
Two other schools that were once in the Mountain West with BYU, Utah and TCU, have had the most success of the dozen schools who moved to or changed Power Five leagues since 2011.
Utah has won two Pac-12 championships (and played in the Rose Bowl twice) since joining the conference and has made an appearance in the league’s title game four of the past five years.
The Utes have had a winning record in conference play eight of their 12 seasons in the…
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