For three years, the Big Eight brushed aside the Southwest Conference's pleas for some kind of an alliance.
But when the Southeastern Conference broke up the College Football Association TV package by cutting its own television deal with CBS, both conferences began to rethink their positions.The final result - Texas, Texas Tech, Texas A&M and Baylor joining the Big Eight in 1996 - came about after 11 frantic days of negotiations.
The process included political deals in Austin and attempts by Texas and Texas A&M to find new conference homes on their own. And, in the end, Houston, Rice, Texas Christian and Houston were left out in the cold.
Here's how the events transpired, as reconstructed by The Dallas Morning News:
When the SEC's television deal was announced, the Big Eight and SWC suddenly saw the value in coming together to form a TV alliance.
The two sides began negotiations with ABC and ESPN earlier this month, but the talks hit a major snag Feb. 16. One of the biggest hurdles was Texas' interest in joining the Pacific-10 Conference.
The Big Eight didn't like the Longhorns' reluctance committing to that league, so they began looking into a TV deal that didn't include the SWC. Texas A&M also began to make inquiries about membership in the SEC, and the SWC-Big Eight talks appeared to be dead.
But Texas and A&M also faced a dilemma: how to get out of the wilting SWC while causing the least damage to fellow SWC members.
The sticking point with their departure, as it had been in past years, was politics. Legislators began scrambling in Austin to find the best solution for the largest number of SWC schools, and the pressure was reportedly on to stop the Longhorns' departure.
"Between Wednesday and Saturday, the chancellor at Texas had a religious experience," one legislator told The Morning News. "By Saturday, Texas was one for four and four for one."
Texas chancellor William Cunningham said that's not quite accurate.
"People want to make this into a political conspiracy," he said. "To say that we didn't think about the politics would be wrong.
"But (Lt.) Gov. (Bob) Bullock was very supportive of the position we took. He did not try to push us into going into the Big Eight nor did he try to keep us from going to the Pac-10."
Either way, Texas ran into some Pac-10 stumbling blocks - geographical incompatibility and the fact that the West Coast-based conference had no interest in other SWC members.
The Big Eight again began to look attractive, and Texas notified Big Eight officials that it would be receptive to an invitation. The Big Eight then extended invitations to Texas, Texas Tech, Baylor and Texas A&M, all quickly accepting.