IOWA CITY, Iowa — The Big Ten has received overtures from different schools but currently is not interested in further expansion, Iowa president Barbara Wilson said Thursday.
“I would say for now that we’re done,” Wilson said at Iowa’s monthly Presidential Committee on Athletics meeting. “If we’re going to grow, it will be for the right reason. Right now, there’s no compelling reason. But I’m one vote in the grand scheme of things.
“We’ve certainly been asked by other schools.”
The Big Ten has added seven schools since 2011 with four West Coast programs (USC, UCLA, Washington, Oregon) becoming members as of Aug. 2. With perpetual questions involving Florida State and Clemson suing the Atlantic Coast Conference related to its grant of rights agreements, expansion remains a front burner topic across the college sports landscape.
Although not an official requirement, membership in the research consortium Association of American Universities is almost mandatory for any prospective candidates. Of the Big Ten’s 18 universities, 17 are AAU members and the other (Nebraska) was a member when it was admitted. Neither Florida State nor Clemson are members.
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“We have implicit criteria for who we want to be part of this conference,” Wilson said. “The academic excellence is really at the (forefront).”
Collaboration also is a key tenet for league institutions through the Big Ten Academic Alliance. It involves every facet of campus life.
“Most of the other conferences don’t have that collaboration at the academic level,” said Wilson, who became Iowa’s president in 2021 after serving as University of Illinois’ interim chancellor and executive vice president. “That’s something we don’t talk about as much as we probably should. We want the institutions to be as similar as possible because those groups wouldn’t be as helpful if we didn’t have those connections.”
Photo: Ben Lonergan / USA Today