The recent news that Colorado is all but assured to be leaving the Pac-12 for the Big-12 (as soon as 2024) is just the latest domino to fall in the conference realignment wars. And while Colorado leaving the Pac-12 isn't a death knell in and of itself, it shows that Colorado's board has read the writing on the wall sooner than Arizona's.

If we're being realistic, the league was dead as soon as UCLA and USC announced they were leaving for the Big-10. Sorry, but San Diego State isn't going to replace that gaping hole. Pac-12 commissioner George Kliakoff's promises of being close to settling on a new media rights deal looks more like goal post moving than it looks like anything to get excited about. How does anyone think those negotiations are going to go with Colorado (the 4th largest media market left in the conference) already out the door? How do we all think those negotiations are going to go knowing that Washington (3rd largest media market left in the conference) and Oregon (most money in the conference) are also playing footsie with the Big-10.

The Conference of Champions is dead, and Arizona needs to forget about loyalty and thing about themselves. The one good piece of news to come from the Colorado stories is that the Big-12 is supposedly setting their eyes on Arizona next. Arizona needs to pick up the phone when they call.

As sad as it is to witness the death of one of the most storied conferences in NCAA history, the reality is that the conference has been on a steady downward trajectory for two decades. The last national champion in men's basketball to come from the conference was Arizona (22 years ago). The last football national champion was USC in 2003 (20 years ago). Men's baseball had done much better with three different national champions in the last decade. But overall, the conference of champions has been the conference of irrelevance.