With the future of college football moving towards two superconferences, it’s time for Washington to either adapt and join up with the Big 10, or sadly fade into irrelevance. All indicators point toward Washington and Oregon both applying to join the Big 10, following in the footsteps of USC and UCLA, who announced on Thursday afternoon that they’d be joining the conference in 2024.

While the college football world waits on Notre Dame to decide whether they want to leave the ACC for all sports other than football, where they’re currently an independent. It feels like no matter what, the Big 10 is going to become (at least) the Big 20 by 2024 when their new TV deal is in place with Fox, the question is, will the Fighting Irish be one of those teams? For the sake of this article, we’re going to say yes, and we’ll make the fourth team in this deal Stanford, so Notre Dame can keep their long-standing rivalry with them alive.

Conference scheduling

Breaking the Big 10 superconference into four pods of five would be relatively simple, and would make travel a lot easier for everyone involved, especially the teams on the west coast. A pod of Washington, Oregon, Stanford, UCLA, and USC would lock in four games on a schedule every year, and each team could add in two new in-conference rivals (I’m personally rooting for a Washington/Wisconsin matchup as one of them that we can call the Battle of the W).

That’s six games, and the other two can be rotating in-conference opponents, as it would be a great opportunity for everyone involved to get a chance to play in new places, and a lot of fun for the fans to have more chances to plan destination trips around their team. Despite the result on the field, Washington fans universally raved about their experience at Michigan in 2021, and making trips like that a more regular experience would be an exciting opportunity for fans.

The Apple Cup

What’s next for the Apple Cup? It’s unclear at this time, but both universities should figure out a way to work it into their non-conference scheduling. While it might not be feasible to hold the game on Thanksgiving weekend as a non-conference game, the in-state rivalry is something that is treasured in Washington and should be held onto if at all possible.

Recruiting

Washington’s new staff has already done a great job recruiting outside of their normal footprint, gaining two commitments from Texas, and one from South Dakota for the class of 2023. With what sounds like more on the way from the middle of the country, the Big 10 would do nothing but help recruiting for the Huskies. If they can go into Wisconsin or Michigan State once every few years for a primetime matchup and walk away with a win would give them more credibility and exposure on the national stage. The class of 2023 has been a very promising step in the right direction for head coach Kalen DeBoer, and a move to the Big 10 could prove to be the final stepping stone to bring Washington back into the national spotlight.