#MSBLFriday411 - Pac-12 Goes Coast-to-Coast

In a change of pace for the sports world, and on a nice positive note for the upcoming season, the Pac-12 and the Oakview group announced more details on their five-year agreement for the "Pac-12 Coast-to-Coast Challenge."

If you have grown up in the Pac-12 footprint as I have, you have heard consistently about the lack of schedule strength of the conference as it relates to the national stage (particularly in football and basketball.) Power-five Basketball is dominated by both the major early-season tournaments (ex. Maui Invitational) but also the conference challenge events. Given that there are obviously only five major conferences, and that the SEC plays the Big-12 and the Big Ten plays the ACC, it has left the Pac-12 frozen out of this opportunity.

Note: The Pac-10 and Big-12 did play in a four-year challenge series from 2007-to-2010 but was not renewed.

Setting this event apart from other conference challenge events will be that all games will be played at major Oak View Group managed arenas. The Oak View Group, outside of their deal with Texas, does not have a significant presence in the college sports sphere will also handle the business side of the relationship, including selling sponsorship and media rights for the event.

The event schedule will start with the following teams facing off this December in Las Vegas at T-Mobile Arena:

· Oregon (M/W) vs. Baylor (M/W)

· Washington (M) vs. Oklahoma (M)

· TCU (M) vs. Colorado (M)

This same group will then face-off the following year (2021) at American Airlines Arena in Dallas. While Arizona, Arizona State, and USC will face-off against Big East members in Las Vegas with return games in 2022, at (possibly) Belmont Park Arena in New York with remaining league teams tipping-off in Vegas. This rotation would continue over the 5-year agreement for the event.

Why is this great for the Pac-12?

It further deepens the league’s relationship with Las Vegas, which has hosted the Men's Basketball tournament since 2013, the Women's tournament since 2019, and will host the football championship starting in 2020. Las Vegas is about as central as you can get with the geographic footprint of the league and easily accessible by each school's fan base.

Most importantly, this gives the Pac-12 the ability to generate quality non-league match-ups and a strategic response to being left out of the conference challenge puzzle. League members have had notable difficulty attracting premier non-league match-ups for home-and-home series requiring members to often have to play at neutral courts or away games. What is particularly ingenious about this approach is that it increases the league's reach and exposure, with maximum effect after the third year when the event will be played in three separate regions of the country. Pac-12 members have alumni bases that are national in nature, and now this event provides member institutions the ability to engage those fans (hopefully) yearly for the foreseeable future.

An unknown that will be interesting to observe is the effect that the economic health of the country will have on sponsorship for the event. According to Front Office Sports, sports marketing company, Two Circles, is projecting that global sports sponsorship rights fees will decline by 37% in 2020-2021, with estimated gross spending of $28.9 billion versus $46.1 billion in 2019. The financial services sector is (on average) the largest sector in sports partnerships, is expected to be the hardest hit with reduced spending of (appx) 45%. The Pac-12's only potential impact being that New York Life is currently the sponsor for the Pac-12 Men's Basketball Tournament.