[Canalejas]

 The Big Ten's discussions are centered on Washington and Oregon, sources told ESPN.

...

  Although there's some presidential interest in adding Cal and Stanford, those potential additions were met with chilly responses last year when the Big Ten pondered adding more teams, in part because of their lack of television resonance. Stanford's addition to the Big Ten has long been paired to a potential Notre Dame addition, which doesn't appear imminent at this point. 

https://www.espn.com/college-football/st...nstability

I think it is time to gameplan the doomsday scenarios. Stanford as a football independent and member of the Big Sky or Big West?

In that type of emergency situation, I'd prefer the Big West.  That's in large part because of where its members are located. And because I have a soft spot for Cal's UC siblings (don't crucify me for that one.)

  

Stanford (and presumably Cal) would join a conference with ten other CA schools plus Hawai'i.  A strange wrinkle is that those schools (evenly split between UCs and CSUs) had friction the last time they expanded.  The CSU group would not approve the addition of UC San Diego until they could find a CSU school to partner with, in order to keep the numbers even between the two systems within the conference.  They eventually settled on adding CSU Bakersfield.  If Cal applies for membership alongside us, would the Big West CSUs want to first convince Sacramento State to join at the same time?  

Anyway, here's the map for the Big Sky: 



Despite the three location pins in CA, only Sacramento State is a full member of the conference.  The other two are football-only members UC Davis and Cal Poly SLO.

[Canalejas]

 The Big Ten's discussions are centered on Washington and Oregon, sources told ESPN.

...

  Although there's some presidential interest in adding Cal and Stanford, those potential additions were met with chilly responses last year when the Big Ten pondered adding more teams, in part because of their lack of television resonance. Stanford's addition to the Big Ten has long been paired to a potential Notre Dame addition, which doesn't appear imminent at this point. 

https://www.espn.com/college-football/st...nstability

I think it is time to gameplan the doomsday scenarios. Stanford as a football independent and member of the Big Sky or Big West?

In that type of emergency situation, I'd prefer the Big West.  That's in large part because of where its members are located. And because I have a soft spot for Cal's UC siblings (don't crucify me for that one.)

  

Stanford (and presumably Cal) would join a conference with ten other CA schools plus Hawai'i.  A strange wrinkle is that those schools (evenly split between UCs and CSUs) had friction the last time they expanded.  The CSU group would not approve the addition of UC San Diego until they could find a CSU school to partner with, in order to keep the numbers even between the two systems within the conference.  They eventually settled on adding CSU Bakersfield.  If Cal applies for membership alongside us, would the Big West CSUs want to first convince Sacramento State to join at the same time?  

Anyway, here's the map for the Big Sky: 



Despite the three location pins in CA, only Sacramento State is a full member of the conference.  The other two are football-only members UC Davis and Cal Poly SLO.