Big 12 to bring back football championship game in 2017

The Big 12 conference, which for years has fought the idea of having a title game after losing two member schools, will bring it back in 2017.

For 15 seasons, the Big 12 decided their football champion with the annual conference championship game at sites like Kansas City, Houston, and St.Louis. In some cases, the game had a say in who would play for the national title that season.

Now, after a slight hiatus following the departure of teams that dropped the number of member schools down to 10, the conference voted to bring back their annual title game starting with the 2017 season:

Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby didn’t address several issues regarding the move, including whether teams would still play the full nine-game conference schedule currently in place or if the league would be broken into two divisions or stay as a full 10 team group with the two top teams playing for the title.

Recently, the NCAA voted to allow conferences to hold a championship game even if they have less than 12 members, which previously had been what kept the Big 12 from hosting a title game each season. Recently, Bowlsby and other conference powers dismissed the idea that a title game was needed for the conference to compete with the other Power Five leagues.

Last season, the conference champion Oklahoma Sooners made it to the College Football Playoff. In 2014, the Baylor Bears and TCU Horned Frogs split the title (with no tiebreaker in place and no title game) and both were left out of the final four group that season.

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