3-point stance: Expansion will take its toll

1. So this is the state of intercollegiate athletics in the Big 12: the regents and the presidents at Texas and Oklahoma are telling each other how great it will be to join the Pac-12 while Longhorns coach Mack Brown is describing the price that move will extract from the players and their families. Remember Brown’s words when the move happens, and Oklahoma president David Boren and Texas president Bill Powers describe how their student-athletes will benefit from a league that spans three time zones.

2. After reading the allegations that the NCAA delivered Monday to South Carolina, it’s difficult to decide what’s more problematic: a) the athletic department allowed 12 student-athletes to receive some $47,000 in extra benefits; or b) the benefits, in the form of housing the players in a hotel at a rate of $14.59 per night, didn’t set off an NCAA alarm in any athletic official’s head. That rate may work for a cheap apartment -- it works out to about $450 per month -- but the Whitney Hotel (AAA rate: $99) is no apartment.

3. Once it became clear that the weather delay at the Oklahoma State-Tulsa game would last hours instead of minutes, how do you keep your 160 athletes, coaches, managers and others fueled? One of coach Mike Gundy’s state trooper escorts took assistant strength coach Tyler Buckminster to a local grocery, where they picked up 8-10 loaves of bread, and a shopping cart full of peanut butter and several flavors of jelly. “I guess if you are hungry enough, you’ll eat whatever is available,” Gundy said Monday.

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