Is this man going to stand athwart against history yelling, "Stop!"?
Perhaps.
Somewhat buried in this ESPN article, whose main point is that the SEC really covets Texas and Oklahoma ahead of Texas A&M (obvious) but that the conference considers neither a legitimate possibility, is the following little nugget:
Looking beyond the Big 12 for expansion, specifically to the ACC for schools such as Georgia Tech, Clemson, Florida State or Miami, was not in the SEC's plans, sources told ESPN.
The sources saw no way the SEC would raid the ACC and added serious doubt that Virginia Tech could be pried away from Virginia.
The idea the SEC would go after Kansas was also dismissed, though a KU source said that would be a preference for the Jayhawks.
Hmm. That's interesting.
Let's do a little head count here of expansion candidates. Texas and Oklahoma are not realistic candidates, per the SEC source stated here. Losing Texas almost certainly eliminates Texas A&M due to the political and cultural realities. And if we're not going to go after ACC schools, that eliminates Florida State, Miami, Georgia Tech, Clemson, North Carolina, and others. And if you aren't going to go after those schools from the ACC, you certainly aren't going after anything the Big East has to offer. And if the notion of Kansas is dismissed, that likely rules out Missouri as well.
So, who does that leave? No one. In which case, of course, the SEC holds pat as we stand right now and does not expand further, even in the wake of mega-expansion by the Pac-10 and Big Ten. For reasons I will expound upon in a later piece, I'd much rather see the SEC eschew any notion of expansion and retain its current structure. Perhaps Mike Slive is prepared to surprise everyone and stand athwart history at a time when the rest of the college football world seems hell-bent on expansion.