As an alumnus of Utah and the University of National Champions, I selfishly would be all in on the idea. Utah is already traveling very far for Big12 games, almost always far enough to require air travel. Most ACC destinations have much better airports and flights than the Big12 schools. The non-revenue sports could play in the Western Pod more often than distant campuses.
FSU and Miami have a pile of national championships in football and Florida is either the best state or second best to Texas as a recruiting source for football talent.
76% of the US population lives in the Eastern or Central time zones, almost half of the US lives in the Eastern time zone. Eyeballs give you stature, recruiting and revenue.
If I ruled the world, I would take us back to the small conferences. When I started college, you could realistically drive to any road game – with Wake, Duke, NC State and UNC within 2 hours of each other on the same interstate. Atlanta and College Park, MD were the longest road trips from Chapel Hill. But we are NEVER going back to that world.
