Sitting at his desk one morning in late September, Tim Pernetti took a call from Jim Delany, commissioner of the Big 10 Conference. The message was simple and understated:

"I'm not sure we're going to do anything, but we should talk," Delany told the Rutgers athletic director.

With that one phone call, a series of events with stakes reaching into the tens of millions of dollars was set in motion — including a flurry of phone calls, hastily arranged meetings in Chicago, a gathering in Washington, called with just a few hours’ notice, at least a dozen conferences with lawyers and a simultaneous series of meetings between Delany and officials from the University of Maryland.

Rutgers’ future would hinge as much on those talks as their own.

Finally, last Tuesday — one day after the Big Ten officially invited Maryland to join the conference — an announcement came that surely sounded more like fantasy than reality to Rutgers’ alumni, students and fans who have long craved for respect.

Rutgers would be leaving the faltering Big East Conference and in 2014 join the vaunted Big Ten, the oldest — and by some measures, richest — conference in collegiate sports.

After decades of struggling to claim a place in big-time, big-money college sports, it took just six breakneck weeks to have everything fall into place for Rutgers.

"A perfect marriage," university President Robert Barchi said of the move.

Accounts provided to The Star-Ledger by Barchi, Greg Brown, a member of the Rutgers Board of Governors, and others familiar with the talks, reveal a process that took rapid flight but nearly failed to lift off.

CRITICAL PIECE OF PUZZLE

To seal the deal that will forever change the face of Rutgers athletics, Pernetti needed poker table cool and the quick-draw sense of when to act. But no matter how badly he wanted to make it happen, Pernetti also knew there was much that was beyond his control.

The first — and most critical — piece of the puzzle came Sept. 13, when the University of Notre Dame severed its ties to the Big East and announced it was joining the Atlantic Coast Conference for all sports except football.

For years, the Big 10 has dreamed of having Notre Dame join the conference. When Notre Dame announced it was going to the ACC, Delany said publicly he was satisfied with keeping things in the Big 10 status quo. But two officials familiar with the discussions said the commissioner was upset the years-long flirtation with Notre Dame had fallen apart.

The officials requested anonymity because they are not authorized to discuss the talks publicly. Through a spokesman, Delany refused to comment and Pernetti would not discuss specifics of the negotiations.

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After the Notre Dame announcement, Pernetti saw an opening. A onetime Rutgers tight end with a reputation as a steely competitor, he owns a set of credentials suitable for these times. As part of the executive team that launched CSTV, the first network devoted soley to college sports, the 42-year-old Pernetti had overseen television packages with several conferences around the country.

"I’m on the deal-making side of the business," he said in a phone interview.

Pernetti had been down this path before, in the summer of 2010 when talks between Rutgers and the Big 10 grew serious only to fizzle. His relationship with Delany, forged over his television years, remained strong.

A few days after Notre Dame’s move, Delany placed the call to Pernetti, who quickly relayed the conversation to Barchi. The newly hired Rutgers president said Pernetti routinely kept him informed on the latest turnabouts in college sports.

The two flew to Chicago during the first week of October for a meeting with Delany and other Big Ten officials at the Chicago O’Hare Hilton, Barchi said.

The first order of business was signing confidentiality agreements. Though no one mentioned Maryland specifically, the two officials familiar with the talks said Delany indicated any deal to bring Rutgers into the Big 10 hinged upon his ability to recruit another school.

At the outset, Delany floated the possibility that Rutgers build a new football stadium, the two officials said. The commissioner quickly pulled back when Rutgers pointed out it had recently poured millions into renovations of High Point Solutions Stadium in Piscataway, the officials said.

After the meeting, Pernetti and Delany talked nearly every day, the officials said. Brown, of the Board of Governors said Barchi and Pernetti kept him and other board members informed on the progress. He would not discuss specifics of those conversations.

During the first week in November, Barchi said, he and Pernetti were summoned by the Big 10 to a hastily called meeting in Washington, not far from the Maryland campus.

According to the two unnamed officials, Delany told the Rutgers contingent any deal was at least several weeks away. He still did not identify the other school he was courting. But less than a week later, on Friday, Nov, 9, Pernetti received a call from Brad Traviolia, the Big Ten’s deputy commissioner, who wanted to know if Rutgers could adjust to a speeded up timetable. Pernetti told him this was not a problem, the two officials said.

DEAL BREAKER

Unknown to Rutgers officials, Delany was holding similar talks with Maryland but he feared the deal could fall apart because of growing opposition on the Maryland campus. A charter member of the Atlantic Coast Conference, the school faces a $50 million exit fee from the league.

If the talks with Maryland collapsed, then the deal with Rutgers would be off.

Last weekend, Pernetti, in Cincinnati with the Rutgers football team, was busy with a flurry of final arrangements, one of the officials familiar with the talks said. He spoke with Delany on Friday night and again on Saturday morning, the 17th, the official said.

Delany was concerned word of the Big 10’s plans were beginning to leak and he wanted to know if Rutgers officials could be nimble enough to make an announcement early in the coming week, the official said.

Just hours after Rutgers defeated Cincinnati, news broke that Maryland and Rutgers would be invited to join the Big 10.

As the Rutgers team plane landed in Newark on Saturday night, Pernetti, the coaches and players turned on their phones. Throughout the cabin rose a symphony of beeps and rings from friends and family who had heard the reports.

Last Monday morning, the Maryland Board of Regents accepted the Big 10 invitation. Hours later, Pernetti went before the Rutgers Board of Governors in what was mostly a formality. Board members were concerned about whether the university would have to pay the full $10 million exit fee required by the Big East, an amount still being negotiated, one of the officials familiar with the talks said. In what became an historic meeting, the Rutgers board ratified a merger with the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey and voted to accept the Big 10’s invitation.

After a frantic six weeks of negotations, the deal was done and, Pernetti said, he could finally begin to relax.

At about 5 p.m. Tuesday, a few hours after standing before the cameras to announce Rutgers’ new home, Pernetti brought his staff into his office and popped the champagne.

Star-Ledger staff writer Tom Luicci contributed to this report.

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