Last year, the Pac-12 lost two schools as USC and UCLA declared to join the Big 10 in 2024. In the last week, six more schools have decided to leave the conference and now only four remain.

University of Washington and Oregon are heading to the Big 10, according to ESPN College Football Senior Writer Pete Thamel. University of Utah, Arizona and Arizona State will be joining the Big 12, said Big 12 Commissioner Brett Yormark. Both Conferences will have 16 schools in 2024, the first season where each of the eight departing Pac-12 teams will compete in their new Conferences.

The only four universities left in the Pac-12 are California, Stanford, Oregon State and Washington State. With so much change in college football, the future of the Pac-12 is bleak, and the future of the Cougs is unknown.

There is no clear option at this point, but there appear to be three realistic options for WSU going into 2024. 

The option that seems the most likely at this time is for the Cougs to pair with OSU and head for the Mountain West Conference. The MWC’s funding is not as good, but acceptance from the Conference should be certain and travel is not an issue.

The option for the optimist would be that the Big 12 decides to keep expanding and takes WSU in. Big 12 funding is better than the Pac-12’s, and the competition would be excellent, but the Big 12’s intentions are unclear.

The least likely option at this point is that the Pac-12 signs a new media rights deal and keeps the current four teams. They would then need to go out and get four to eight more teams to join to form an almost entirely new conference.

Stanford and Cal’s decisions going forward could heavily influence which of those options ends up becoming reality. And while there has not been much news on that front, it will certainly start to pick up now.

Stay tuned in the coming days and weeks because this rollercoaster ride is far from over and only speeding up.