The college football superconference is coming. In fact, it’s closer than you think.

Step one? The loss of regional hegemony. Conferences like the Big 12 and the Big East looked outside their regional footprint for new teams

Step two? The new playoff system, coming to college football in 2014. This is the much rumored format with the top four teams playing in national semifinals, with winners playing in the national championship game. If it’s supposed to make things fairer, it will in terms of competition. But in terms of money and prestige, the stripping of the automatic qualifying status will leave an uneven economic playing field.

Step three? The consolidation of power. The Big Ten and Pac-12 have always had it, thanks to their unyielding allegiance to the Rose Bowl, and they’ve used that chip to influence how the BCS distributes its bowl teams. Now the Big 12 and SEC have joined forced to create their own bowl partnership that pretty much guarantees them a Rose Bowl-level contest every year, regardless of the playoff. It assures that the bowl system is still the most powerful cog in college football.

Step four? It has to be the college football superconference, the 16-team behemoth that the Pac-10 nearly became a couple of years ago. Why? If there’s no automatic qualifying status in the BCS, then the power will be centralized with the conferences that have the teams with the best chance to win a national title. That’s the Big 12, the Big Ten, the Pac-12 and the SEC, so they’ll be the ones to form the new college football superconferences. The ACC and the Big East were built on basketball, and football, frankly, is an afterthought.

Florida State finally figured that out. That’s why they’re making so much noise about joining the Big 12.

So how does this all go down? Well, theoretically there are 16 slots available to create four 16-team superconferences using the Big 12, Big Ten, Pac-12 and SEC. Let’s assume that all four conferences get the same idea at the same time – go to 16 teams. Let’s also assume they don’t poach each other. Here’s how I think it goes:

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What in the world is Florida State up to? Perhaps no program has ever put itself out there on the realignment limb so boldly. And how did the Big 12 get dragged into this?

Those are all practical questions.

Over the weekend, the good news of the ACC’s new TV contract with ESPN turned ugly. Florida State wasn’t happy, or at least one guy at FSU wasn’t happy – Andy Haggard, the president of the FSU board of trustees, as reported by Warpaint.com. Why? Well, Haggard said that the league gave away its third-tier TV rights for football, but not basketball. Turns out Haggard’s logic was dead wrong (ESPN received all tiered rights to ACC programming), but FSU has never really been comfortable with the notion that the ACC thinks basketball first.

If I were Haggard, I’d be unhappy with the overall price tag, which is less than both the Big Ten and Pac-12, and about to be less than the SEC and Big 12, even if the logic of that unhappiness is unjustified. So Haggard threw out there that FSU should explore its options, and mentioned the Big 12 by name. Then FSU’s football coach, Jimbo Fisher, did the same thing. Well, that’s cool except …

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So why on earth did the Big East boil over in the form of John Marinatto’s resignation?

Well, he was asked to resign by the conference’s school presidents, which is basically a vote of no confidence. I think the school presidents were sick of being reactive, instead of proactive, during the conference realignment process. But part of that falls on them, honestly. In an article published on CBSSports.com earlier this week, the writer pointed out a decision by the presidents of the Big East in 2011 that probably dug Marinatto’s grave. That decision? To turn down ESPN’s offer of $1.4 billion for its football TV rights. That’s billion. As in boneheaded. It’s been nothing but downhill from there. This is why university presidents should never be allowed to make athletic decisions, and vice versa.

Give Marinatto credit for doing all he could to create a viable football league. Sure, the name “Big East” is a joke now geographically, but he did the best he could under the circumstances. According to Mike Tranghese, it was Marinatto who ensured the league survived after Miami, Boston College and Virginia Tech left.

And now? I’m sure the presidents will bring in an outsider and expect gargantuan results that can’t be delivered. I would be stunned if ESPN offered the Big East the type of money for TV rights that it did last year. And in the bloodlust to stay in the BCS – which, by the way, is going away from automatic qualifier status for conferences – they’ve effectively dismembered the best basketball league in college sports.

I’d be stunned if Marinatto’s successor is able to hold this league together for another five years. I’d give it three.

Why is ODU dragging its feet with Conference USA, who will win the Big Ten and why shouldn’t you feel bad for Luke Fickell? Find out that and more after the jump.

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Which BCS playoff format are you leaning toward – a format in which the Top 4 teams, regardless of finish, reach the BCS playoffs, or a format in which the Top 4 conference champions reach the BCS playoffs?

I’m with Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott on this one. I’d rather see a format in which winning a conference title is justly rewarded, especially since four of the six BCS conferences require their conference champion to win a conference title game. My biggest issue with the Alabama-LSU matchup in this year’s BCS National Championship game was the fact that Alabama reached the game without winning its conference title (and after losing to LSU in the regular season). I don’t like the idea of a team that didn’t win its conference title being rewarded with a playoff berth. The only scenario in which I would find it acceptable is if you rewarded each conference champion in FBS with a playoff berth in a larger playoff format. Since we know that isn’t going to happen, let’s restrict access to the ones that rise to the top of their conference.

Where does Notre Dame go from here with Tommy Rees? Which non-BCS conference made out the best in expansion? Find out that and more after the jump.

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