Now that Syracuse and Pitt are moving to the ACC, it looks like the ball is really rolling on realignment and superconferences. West Virginia and Texas A&M look to be headed to the SEC, and that would seem to be the final nail in the coffin for the Big East (at least as a football conference), and now we're hearing that Texas is finally realizing that the only sensible option is to move west and join a Pac-16 with Texas Tech and the Oklahomas. From that Burnt Orange Nation link:

"Texas would have to add Pac-12 (soon to be 16) content to the LHN programming. The Longhorns would be able to keep all of their revenue from the network. However, if one-sixteenth of the money the Pac-12 receives from third-tier rights ends up being a larger amount, the schools would divide the revenue evenly and everybody would receive the same amount, the source said."

The other rumored development is the use of a four-team pod system for the new Pac-16-to-be, with Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas, and Texas Tech in one pod. In the previously mentioned Hookem.com report, sources indicated that the team with the best record from two aligned pods would play the team with the best record from the other two aligned pods for the conference championship game, with conference members playing the teams in their own pod each season and two teams from each of the other three pods.

I assume, if that's true, that the pods and alignments would end up looking like this:

Pacific aligned pods

Northwest Pod

Washington

Washington State

Oregon

Oregon State

California Pod

California

Stanfurd

USC

UCLA

Southwestern aligned pods



Mountain West Pod

Arizona

Arizona State

Colorado

Utah

Texas/OK Pod

Texas

Texas Tech

Oklahoma

Oklahoma State

That sounds fine with me. We keep our CA rivalries intact, and the scheduling is fairly balanced throughout. I like it. What do you guys think?

UPDATE: Avi has some more analysis here at his Pacific Takes blog: