"We recognize, however, that future conditions may make it advantageous to expand the number of institutions in the league," Machen said. "We discussed criteria and process associated with expansion. No action was taken with respect to any institution including Texas A&M."

A high-ranking source within Texas A&M confirmed to ESPN's Doug Gottlieb on Saturday the Aggies were intent on joining the Southeastern Conference. And they reportedly hoped to begin play in the league starting as soon as 2012.

Additionally, ESPN.com's Andy Katz is reporting that athletic director Bill Byrne left the men's basketball team's foreign trip Sunday morning out of Paris to head back to College Station to deal with the likelihood that A&M will head to the SEC. According to a source, as long as the SEC were to eventually back a move all indications are that the Aggies will vote to go.

The Texas A&M System board of regents has a meeting slated for Monday that includes an agenda item about conference alignment.

An SEC official had told The New York Times ahead of Sunday's meeting that there was still a 30 percent to 40 percent chance the Aggies would not get enough votes for an invitation. And the issue of needing to add a 14th team along with A&M remained, the newspaper reported.

"We realize if we do this, we have to have the 14th," the SEC official said. "No name has been thrown out. This thing is much slower out of the chute than the media and blogs have made it."

The official told The Times that Texas A&M president R. Bowen Loftin called SEC commissioner Mike Slive three weeks ago and said the Aggies regretted not leaving the Big 12 for the SEC last summer.

Loftin said in a statement Sunday there is "a considerable amount of misinformation" regarding the school and the SEC. Loftin said he did not participate in Sunday's meeting with the SEC, but is authorized by the regents to "take all actions related to athletic conference alignment."

Arkansas chancellor Dave Gearhart was at the meeting Sunday and said A&M was among a number of topics discussed.

"It was really an open discussion, not just about A&M but about the future of the conference and the future of other conferences," Gearhart said. "We did talk about Texas A&M. It's a great university, a great place. But I think the decision was to make no decision at this particular time."

"(Texas A&M) did approach the SEC, not the other way around," Gearhart said. "I'm not really sure of all the reasons for that. I'm sure that there's a lot of speculation on behalf of a lot of people that what caused them to do that.

"The bottom line is they did approach the SEC."

Gearhart said the SEC presidents and chancellors are "very comfortable" with the 12-team alignment, financially and competitively. But he, too, said they wouldn't rule out expansion.

"If some other conference is going to make changes, it behooves us to take a look at that," said Gearhart.

He added: "I think everybody will sort of be watching what happens in Texas and what they do."

Gearhart said he didn't come away from the meeting with any clearer idea of what form future conferences might take. He said talk of four "super conferences" was just that -- talk.

As for how any future alignment would affect the SEC, or if the conference would look actively look to add schools, Gearhart pointed to the league's history of success and his confidence in commissioner Mike Slive.