Big 12 or busted?

The other news/hints/allegations/things left unsaid (Collective Soul anyone? c'mon) while I was gone was that as the conference tectonics continue to shift, they may not be shifting in UofL's favor.

For a long time it was presumed UofL was on-deck for the Big 12 after the battle with West Virginia last year left us on the outside looking in.

Now, the buzz seems to be swarming that if, and that's still a big if, the Big 12 conference chooses to expand, that Florida State and Clemson will be the two added, leaving the Cards in the cold once again.

And I'm starting to develop a frickin' complex here. Akin to the "Seinfeld" episode where Jerry was dating the beautiful Christine Taylor (Ben Stiller's wife, Melody from "Heyyy Dude") and he viewed her perfectly, yet George and Kramer and everyone else saw some hidden flaw that escaped him.

That's how I feel. I mean, I can get some perspective and can see how us or West Virginia was a close call, but Clemson? Frickin' Clemson?

We all know this is being driven by athletics and namely football. But the Cards are at least on par with those Tigers with a trajectory and head coach heading far more skyward.

Our only football drawback is in conference security. Put the Cards securely in the Big 12 and just think what Charlie & Co. could accomplish on the recruiting trail.

Not to mention our basketball and the star power and intrigue that UofL brings to that equation (again, compared with Clemson), and the overall competitiveness and competence from top to bottom our athletic department brings to the equation under Tom Jurich, and once again, I'm stuck staring at a mirror and wondering where my double-chin is than the rest of the world seems to see but I cannot.

I know it's s'posed to do with TV markets and number crunching stats done somewhere in the great beyond, but fuck that. Maybe it should be, but it's not. There's no way in the world that the Clemson Tigers are more attractive than the Louisville Cardinals.

Not with these facilities, not with Charlie Strong engineering The Train, not with Tom Jurich's vision and the way UofL is raking in dough, and not with a fanbase that believes in a Prophecy of a Collision Course more fervently than many hold their own religious beliefs.

Nevertheless, UofL again is in Limbo, and a Big East future seems to be the way the winds are blowing. And the Cardinal faithful perhaps need to start getting jazzed for a future rivalry against Boise State (maybe) for Big East conference supremacy.

I'm worried. But I still hold on to that innate faith, the same spoken of amongst old-timers when the Cards were still playing under the roofed stadium at Old Cardinal. The idea that patience is a virtue, our will undeniable, our future (and sense of humor in pursuit) limitless, and our trajectory still on the Collision Course.

Big 12 or not. That is the question.