Commissioner Greg Sankey opened SEC Media Days in Nashville with a state-of-the-conference address that targeted Texas.
The Longhorns are coming to the SEC along with Oklahoma in 2024. Sankey announced that SEC Media Days will be in Dallas next season. Sankey appeared to be rolling out the welcome mat – until he turned his speech toward Name, Image and Likeness reform.
"Our student-athletes deserve something better than a patchwork of state laws that support their NIL activity, if support is the right word," Sankey said. "Our student-athletes deserve better than a race to the bottom at the state legislature level."
In fact, that will be Sankey's next challenge in the SEC. How does the conference maintain a relationship with its two Texas schools as NIL continues into the 12-team College Football Playoff era?
That starts in Texas when HB 2804 goes into effect, which will allow colleges and private institutions to interact with collectives. According to the Dallas Morning News, the HB 2804 says “no athletic conference or group can prohibit Texas colleges from participating in sports or penalize them for engaging in activities the new law authorizes.” Arkansas, Missouri and Oklahoma have similar laws.
That is why Sankey called for congressional help and a federal law that would allow for more regulation of NIL. In other words, it would allow for conference-wide policies that would create uniformity for the strongest conference in college football.
"In many ways, NIL has been a net positive for young people competing in collegiate athletics, but it has also created a series of realities that put the long-term viability of collegiate athletics at risk,” Sankey said. “We all know there are stories—some told and many untold—of false promises, empty commitments, NIL agreements unfulfilled, inducements offered but not provided, and other behaviors that rightly cause concern."
The tallest tales still come from the Texas schools in the old Southwest Conferences – with legends of Gold Trans Ams and bags full of money. As former Texas A&M coach Jackie Sherrill said in a 2020 ESPN look-back, “The oil money in Texas made a big difference." It also contributed to SMU getting the first-ever Death Penalty from the NCAA and the conference's demise.
Arkansas was the only school from the conference to move to the SEC, and that left eight schools that had to relocate conferences in 1996. That included Texas and Texas A&M – which moved to the Big 12.
Original Texas Southwest Conference schools
| SCHOOL | MOVED TO | NOW |
| Baylor | Big 12 | Big 12 |
| Houston | C USA | Big 12 |
| Texas | Big 12 | SEC |
| Texas A&M | Big 12 | SEC |
| Texas Tech | Big 12 | Big 12 |
| Rice | WAC | C USA |
| SMU | WAC | American |
| TCU | WAC | Big 12 |
It took schools such as TCU and Houston decades to get back to the power conference level because of the fallout, perhaps a reason why Horned Frogs coach Sonny Dykes took a shot at realignment at Big 12 Media Days last week.
There is no doubt Sankey knows all this history – and should be determined not to let it repeat itself in a conference that has dominated college football through the Bowl Championship Series and College Football Playoff eras heading into the 12-team playoff chapter in 2024.
Texas and Texas A&M still have money. The Aggies have created attention since joining the conference without winning it. Remember the feud between Jimbo Fisher and Nick Saban after Saban said “A&M bought every player on their team.”
Texas has the Longhorn Network, which will fold into the SEC Network in 2024. That doesn't mean Texas – which brought in $25 million more in revenue than Alabama in last season – will not command an inordinate amount of attention regardless of what happens on the field. How do the Longhorns respond to being in a room with all those SEC heavyweights – including four in Alabama, Florida, LSU and Georgia who have won multiple national championships since Texas won its last one in 2005? How will that always-uneasy relationship between Texas and Texas A&M play out?
These are long-term questions for Sankey, who has a couple potential headaches. The SEC does not need Texas and Texas A&M to be national championship contenders at football to maintain its perch as the top conference in college football. Yet Sankey will have to continue to monitor how the Longhorns and Aggies leverage NIL and collectives in an effort to become national championship contenders.
We're talking about Texas – a state with countless extravagant high-school stadiums that could pass for college venues. It's a football-crazy state that plays by its own rules at times. In this case, we are talking about HB 2804. Will those schools work with Sankey? Or will this be the start of a contentious relationship before the Longhorns play their first game in the conference?
It is a relationship worth watching. It will help define the next chapter of Sankey's tenure — and perhaps – the entire college football landscape.