The 100-Year Decision: Texas A&M and the SEC (The Swaim-Paup-Foran Spirit of Sport Series)

On September 26, 2011, following several years of rampant rumors and some of the most chaotic times in the history of conference affiliations in intercollegiate athletics, the Southeastern Conference officially announced that Texas A&M University would join its ranks, effective the following July. 

A&M was to become the thirteenth member of this prestigious athletic conference and the first addition to the SEC since South Carolina and Arkansas had joined in 1992. Andy Staples, writing for Sports Illustrated, characterized this decision as “the most significant win-win for one league and one school in three years of conference realignment.”

The 100-Year Decision: Texas A&M and the SEC is the compelling, first-person account of the events that led to A&M’s historic, high-stakes exit from the Big 12 conference and its entry into the SEC.

In the summer of 2010, Texas A&M University president R. Bowen Loftin, troubled by persistent rumors and innuendo, began investigating the shifting landscape of collegiate conference affiliations and its effect on his own university. In this candid memoir, readers will witness what happened in the closed-door meetings that fed this Texas-sized controversy, with all the deception, manipulation, political pressure, and dealmaking anyone could expect.