The Pac-12 on Monday took the next step in the latest phase of its remodeling project, announcing CBS as the conference’s “primary long-term media partner” beginning next summer.
No other network partners were revealed as the conference continues to negotiate with other distributors for the remaining portion of its media rights inventory.
Additional partners will “be announced at a later date,” according to the Pac-12.
The five-year deal with CBS was approved by all eight current and future members of the conference. It serves as an extension of the two-game agreement between CBS and the Pac-12 for the 2025 football season, when Washington State and Oregon State are the lone members.
The deal expires in the summer of 2031.
“Our goal with this process was to find transformational partnerships for the new Pac-12, and throughout our discussions and time together it became more and more clear that a partnership with CBS Sports would be just that,” Pac-12 commissioner Teresa Gould said in a news release.
CBS will broadcast the Pac-12 football championship and the championship game of the men’s basketball tournament, plus at least three regular-season football and men’s basketball games. (Those events will be aired on Paramount+, as well.)
Additionally, an undisclosed number of games in both sports will be shown on CBS Sports Network.
The valuation of the CBS deal was not disclosed, in part because the Pac-12 remains in active negotiations with other networks over the remaining pieces of its media rights partnerships.
In that regard, Gould and Octagon, the conference’s media rights consultant, are not following the standard blueprint.
Typically, major college conferences disclose their media rights agreements only when all partners are secured and the critical details finalized.
Most recently, the Big Ten announced all partner networks (Fox, CBS and NBC) at the same time, in Aug. 2022, while the Big 12 revealed the extension of its agreement with ESPN and Fox a few months later.
But the Pac-12 took a different approach. It locked in CBS as the primary partner and decided not to wait for the remainder of the deal to come together before going public.
“Extending this partnership strengthens our multi-platform college football and basketball schedule and, at a pivotal moment for the new Pac-12, allows us to collaborate, grow the conference and expand its reach,” Dan Weinberg, CBS Sports’ executive vice president for programming, noted in the news release.
(CBS also partners with the Big Ten for football and men’s basketball and holds the rights, along with Turner, to the NCAA Tournament.)
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Since last fall, when the Pac-12 secured the additions of Boise State, Colorado State, Fresno State, San Diego State and Utah State from the Mountain West, plus Gonzaga from the West Coast Conference, the Pac-12 has adopted a blank-slate view of all major decisions.
And there are more moves on the chessboard.
In coming weeks, the conference is expected to secure at least one, and as many as three, additional media rights partners.
Also, it must invite at least one all-sports member by July 1, 2026 in order to comply with conference certification requirements. (Texas State is among the schools under consideration for the ninth membership spot.)
The deal with CBS is “inclusive of one additional football-playing, all-sports member” being added, the conference noted.
However, the phased approach to revealing its network partners suggests the Pac-12 could be weeks away from wrapping up both the media rights and membership components to its rebuilding project.
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