The recent wave of conference realignment has upended Division I college athletics and the 2023 college football season will be the the final year before these dramatic conference shifts take place. What set all of this upheaval in motion was the decision of both the Oklahoma Sooners and Texas Longhorns to leave the Big 12 for the SEC, and both schools are entering the final year in their current league.
Oklahoma and Texas will officially join the SEC in 2024 for all sports and the league has already set the conference schedule for their arrival. The two powerhouse programs were originally slated to make the jump in 2025, but eventually settled with the Big 12 to leave a year early and will pay a combined exit fee of $100 million. The Big 12 itself has been aggressive in its expansion efforts in the aftermath of OU and UT’s decision to leave, with BYU, Cincinnati, Houston, and UCF joining in 2023 and Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado, and Utah joining in 2024.
The Sooners’ and Longhorns’ arrival to the SEC will be made official on July 1, 2024, when the Division I calendar for the 2024-25 academic season officially begins.
