Pac-12 legal affairs: With key court date looming, parties agree to mediation
The Pac-12’s two remaining schools and the 10 departing universities have agreed to mediation in an attempt to settle their dispute over governance of the conference, according to a source with knowledge of the situation.
“The talks have been productive,” the source said. “Everybody wants them to succeed. It just has to be on fair terms to everybody.”
“Them,” of course, is Washington State and Oregon State – the schools left behind in the realignment game that decimated the conference in early August.
One month later, Washington State and Oregon State took commissioner George Kliavkoff and the 10 outbound schools to court to gain clarity on the makeup of the governing board, which controls the Pac-12’s assets.
Washington State and Oregon State believe the departing universities relinquished their board seats when they agreed to join other leagues starting next summer and that, if allowed to remain on the board, the 10 could vote as a bloc in ways that undermine the ability of WSU and OSU to possibly rebuild the conference.
A preliminary injunction hearing to determine the makeup of the board is scheduled for Nov. 14 in Whitman County Superior Court.
The various legal steps prior to that point include an expedited discovery process, which could lead to sensitive information becoming public.
It’s not unusual for mediation to unfold alongside litigation. However, the willingness to engage a mediator hardly guarantees the sides will reach an agreement, especially given the early stage of the legal process. A trial likely would be months away.
“We’ll see if the two sides can figure out a path and avoid a trial,” the source said.
The conference office declined to comment.
Washington State and Oregon State have several options once the 108-year-old athletic conference fractures next summer:
• They could join the Mountain West in a traditional expansion move.
• They could execute a reverse merger in which the Mountain West schools dissolve their league and compete under the Pac-12 banner.
• They could make use of an obscure NCAA rule and compete as a two-team conference in the 2024-25 seasons, then either join the Mountain West or execute the reverse merger.
(The NCAA requires conferences to have at least eight members but provides a two-year grace period to reach that threshold.)
The 10 outbound schools are concerned about the use of the Pac-12’s financial assets, which include more than $60 million in NCAA Tournament revenue.
If WSU and OSU are deemed the sole members of the governing board, the source said, they could keep the Pac-12 alive for up to 24 months, then pocket the assets, shutter the conference and join the Mountain West.
“That wouldn’t be fair to the other 10,” the source said.
But the Pac-10 and the Pac-2 have very different interpretations of what constitutes fair. Can mediation work? Like everything else about this legal dispute, resolution could be weeks or months away.