Growing consensus that UC Board wants to make UCLA suffer a lot

Pac-12 media day has arrived, and there is plenty to discuss with everything going on in the conference.

Of course, USC and UCLA are topic No. 1 with their move to the Big Ten in a couple of seasons.

Pac-12 Commissioner George Kliavkoff had a lot to say about both programs, although there are more concerns for the UCLA Bruins than for the USC Trojans.

The UC Board of Regents and California Governor Gavin Newsom aren’t thrilled with UCLA’s blindside move. Now, UCLA faces real political issues with a move to the Big Ten, according to Jon Wilner of the San Jose Mercury News.

Those words came directly from Kliavkoff, and Wilner confirms that he has heard similar rumblings in the past few weeks.

UCLA is receiving major backlash from the board, and that isn’t good news for them going forward. USC doesn’t need to worry about that one bit since they are a private institution, so their move is much easier.

UCLA is still going to move to the Big Ten, but the real news story here is that the UC Board seems intent on making the Bruins pay up to help subsidize the University of California at Berkeley’s athletic program. The Bruins will make a ton of money in the Big Ten, so they will be able to pay these costs over a longer period of time. However, this will still cut into UCLA’s expected profit margin in the Big Ten, which could have an effect on the Bruins’ Olympic sports, which are highly valued by the school.

If UCLA ends up staying in the Pac-12 (which is unlikely), then the Big Ten will need to move quickly to find a replacement. This probably doesn’t have any impact on USC, as the Trojans themselves are a major selling point for the Big Ten with Lincoln Riley in town.

But, for now, UCLA has some hurdles to figure out, and things could change quickly. Stay tuned.