Sometimes change in college football has been slow and deliberate.

Other times, like this past week, it has come with lightning speed.

In just a few days, the Pac-12 conference has gone from trying to figure out a path forward to its current near-complete collapse.

The latest blow to what had called itself the “Conference of Champions” had the biggest impact on the state of Utah as the Big 12 announced late Friday evening that it voted unanimously to add Arizona State University, the University of Arizona and a third school:

The University of Utah.

Yes, believe it or not, the BYU-Utah rivalry will be back starting in 2024.

“We are excited to now welcome Arizona, Arizona State and Utah to the Big 12 in addition to Utah,” BYU president Shane Reese said in a social media post. “Having 16 member institutions will be a great strength to the conference.”

BYU director of athletics Tom Holmoe, who has worked extensively with administrators at Utah and the other schools, echoed those same sentiments in his statement:

“I’m grateful to Big 12 leadership for seeing this through,” Holmoe said in the social media post. “The conference keeps getting stronger and we are thankful to add more Big 12 rivals in closer proximity.”

The renewal of the rivalry was something that seemed almost unthinkable a couple of years ago, since the Pac-12 had made it very clear it wasn’t ever going to invite BYU.

While the rivalries with Arizona and Arizona State cooled when the two schools left the WAC in 1978, the situation with the Utes was more complicated.

The Pac-12 chose Utah as its second choice more than a decade ago when its original play to grab six Big 12 schools failed, a fact that irritated many Cougar supporters to no end.

The Utes made an enormous to-do about their new status, plastering Pac-12 emblems everywhere.

Though it took some time, Utah eventually came to be a big-time player in the league, particularly in football, women’s basketball and gymnastics.

Now, however, the Utes are going to have to start over — just one year after BYU does.

“We are thrilled to welcome Arizona, Arizona State and Utah to the Big 12,” Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark said in the official press release. “The Conference is gaining three premier institutions both academically and athletically, and the entire Big 12 looks forward to working alongside their presidents, athletic directors, student-athletes and administrators.”

Beginning with the 2024-25 academic year, the Big 12 Conference will be comprised of 16 members: Arizona, Arizona State, Baylor, BYU, UCF, Cincinnati, Colorado, Houston, Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State, Oklahoma State, TCU, Texas Tech, Utah and West Virginia.

The timeline of events that have resulted in Utah, Arizona State and Arizona following Colorado’s lead to leave the Pac-12 for the Big 12 have been a jumbled mess of uncertainty and changing directions.

The seeds of the current situation were sowed when the Pac-12 struggled to find its footing with its own network, then compounded it by struggling on the gridiron during recent years.

Sparked by the opportunities available when the league’s current media deal was set to expire in 2024 and with no big deal forthcoming, USC and UCLA jumped at an opportunity to join the Big 10, even though it would mean traveling across the country.

Schools like Utah and Arizona State frequently expressed their commitment to the conference during the uncertain months that followed with no media deal in place.

Colorado finally decided it had enough in July and officially returned to its former league, the Big 12.

Many observers thought the Big 12 was in dire straits when it lost key brands Oklahoma and Texas to the SEC, but instead under the direction of Bob Bowlsby and then Yormark, it found stability.

The Pac-12 unveiled a media rights option on Tuesday that was heavily contingent on streaming through Apple TV+, but it didn’t inspire confidence in the member institutions.

The dominoes continued to topple as Arizona started talking in earnest about leaving, then reached a tipping point as Oregon and Washington became serious options to join the Los Angeles schools in the Big 10.

At that point, it clearly became every school for itself and the Arizona schools and Utah moved rapidly to make the most of their Big 12 opportunity.

Some Cougar fans didn’t want to see Utah in the same league with BYU again, hoping to see the Utes suffer in a lower position.

On the flip side, some Utah fans held out the somewhat farfetched hope that they would get a chance to join the Big 10 and get more money.

In the end, however, both sides will just have to get accustomed to once again seeing each other in conference play every year, something that hasn’t happened since 2010.

The more diplomatic sports fans in Utah likely view this as the best possible scenario, since the BYU-Utah football game is annually the biggest sporting event in the state and gets tremendous attention.

Now everyone will just have to wait a year and then both schools will finally be together in a power conference, with all the benefits and challenges that come with it.

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