NCAA Basketball: Impact of USC and UCLA set to join the Big Ten in 2024

What UCLA and USC joining does to the Big Ten

Getting the UCLA Bruins and the USC Trojans is obviously quite the move for the Big Ten, who will now have schools within 15 miles of the ocean on each side of the United States. There are reports that they will not stop at 16 teams, and have considered Oregon, Stanford, Cal, Arizona, TCU, and Kansas as well.

This move is a counterpunch to the SEC absorbing Texas and Oklahoma around this time last year. It solidifies the Big Ten as at least one of the top two conferences moving forward in both basketball and football.

Let’s say the Big Ten also absorbs four of the six teams that were listed above, making it a 20 team conference. Would anyone really be surprised by that at this point? I certainly wouldn’t. The SEC would certainly follow suit, and we would have two conferences holding 40 of the most powerful (monetarily and otherwise) schools in the country.

The conference divisions will be quite interesting as UCLA, USC (and potentially others) join as early as 2024. Will we see a massive reconfiguration of divisional alignment, or will they simply be randomly assigned to one or the other of the existing divisions?

Being known as a conference that has struggled in March Madness, adding Andy Enfield and Mick Cronin to their coaching ranks certainly cannot hurt. Both have great March Madness resumes at their current schools.