Since Texas A&M’s departure for the SEC, Texas has decided that it will play a different opponent every year on Thanksgiving Day rather than stick with a series with the Aggies as a nonconference game.
This year’s game will be against TCU on Thursday and it appears the Longhorns are interested in having a rotation of Big 12 opponents come to Austin every year going forward on the holiday weekend. According to the Dallas Morning News, Texas Tech will come to Austin on Thanksgiving to play in 2013. Next year’s Big 12 schedule is expect to be released later this week — perhaps tomorrow — so confirmation of that report should be coming in short order.
Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby told DMN reporter Chuck Carlton this weekend that the league is looking into the long-term feasibility of the idea, but that it had been worked out for the next few years.
“It creates a dynamic in the schedule that’s a challenge,” Bowlsby said. “It’s easy to make it so they play every Thanksgiving. It’s not easy to make it so they play every Thanksgiving at home, which is what they want. So that requires other accommodations.
“But at least in the near term we think we have it done.”
Bowlsby said earlier this year upon taking the job as Big 12 commissioner that he would not serve as a puppet for the likes of Texas and Oklahoma, yet Texas is getting approval on a request. Bowlsby said that most schools prefer not to play on Thanksgiving Day.
Special treatment for the Longhorns? Perhaps, but the decision’s reportedly been made — at least for the next few years.
