I’ve said it many times before: While college football is my favorite sport, this Thursday and Friday — the first two full days of March Madness — are my two favorite sports days of the year. As such, I solicited and included a few football/basketball combo questions.

But first … what else?

Note: Submitted questions have been lightly edited for length and clarity. 

What’s the Pac-12’s end game here? With the Big Ten and SEC in clear expansion mode for the past decade, what makes the Pac-12 (and to a lesser extent the ACC) think that standing pat at their current membership is the best way forward? The Big 12, to its credit, is at least trying to expand, both now and two years ago, but doesn’t have the attractiveness. Consolidation is the name of the game in college sports, so why is the Pac-12 refusing to engage in it? — Benjamin D.

You answered your own question with the words “doesn’t have the attractiveness.” There’s a big dropoff from Texas/Oklahoma/USC/UCLA to any remaining “free agent” in the country, save for Notre Dame, which is never joining the Pac-12. You could argue the league should have gone out and added some combo of TCU/Baylor/Houston/Oklahoma State back in 2021, mostly so they wouldn’t seem so vulnerable right now, but based on viewership data, none of those schools would have increased the value of their pending TV deal.

The one school the Pac-12 could have added anytime in the last 40 years that would have absolutely created value is BYU. But generation after generation of the league’s presidents made it clear they wanted nothing to do with a church-owned university that’s not a research institution, just like they’ve thumbed their nose at Boise State. Now, they’re down to the likes of San Diego State and SMU, which would help keep the roster at 12 but will not move the needle in terms of interest from media partners.

I know everyone likes to dream up scenarios where the SEC and Big Ten keep swooping up teams for the next 10-15 years, but those leagues make so much money per school now that there are only three to six programs left that would actually be additive: Notre Dame, Clemson, Florida State, perhaps Miami if it ever figures out football again, and, debatably, Oregon and Washington. If the Big Ten does eventually add those two, it will be more to give USC/UCLA partners than to increase a TV deal.

All of which is why Bruce, Max Olson and I spent part of “The Audible” this week discussing a more radical consolidation idea former ESPN president John Skipper proposed: Merging the ACC and Pac-12 — preferably in football only. They still wouldn’t be the SEC or Big Ten in terms of TV revenue ($60-plus million), but the schools would make more than they do now (around $30 million), for several reasons: 1) The ACC would be able to blow up its outdated ESPN deal, 2) The ACC Network would add a whole lot of in-market subscriber fees in cities like San Francisco and Phoenix, and 3) You’d create more high-end matchups the networks would pay for, like Oregon-Clemson or Washington-Miami.

It’s drastic, but it’s the only form of “consolidation” that really makes sense for either league if the goal is to add value, not bodies.

If SMU is getting so much attention as a target for the Pac-12, why aren’t Tulane and Memphis getting similar looks? Both have competed in New Year’s Six bowls, are in fertile recruiting territory that opens new television markets and play in the Central time zone. It seems if you’re going to expand anyway, go big and become the Pac-16. — Red Dot

Reminder, New York Times all-access readers: Please write your name. We can’t see yours. Hence, Red Dot. I’m going to make up that he’s Red Dot from Tulsa.

Frankly, I’m surprised Memphis didn’t get a longer look from the Big 12. Maybe it still will. The Tigers’ once-dormant football program has been pretty good for a decade now, men’s basketball has at times been a powerhouse and the Memphis area produces a ton of talent. I can’t see it for the Pac-12, though, because, as I’ve written before, Pac-12 presidents are high and mighty about academics, and U.S. News — again, not me personally, but U.S. News — ranks the school 263rd in the country.

You might be onto something with Tulane, though. Tulane is a top-50 university located in a major sports market smack dab in the most fertile recruiting region of the country. There’s a lot to like there. On the other hand, as great as last season was, it was the first time in 24 years that Tulane produced a ranked football team. It does not have the track record of Cincinnati, UCF or Houston.

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Bigger picture, though, we don’t know if the Pac-12 even has an expansion plan. Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark has been completely transparent in his strategy to go full-national. Pac-12 commissioner George Kliavkoff and his presidents have expressed no such vision. Do they want to stay entirely in the Mountain/Pacific time zones, or is getting into a new time zone important for exposure and recruiting? Or, do they want to just stay exactly the way they are? This is a guess, not based on any specific intel, but my likelihood ranking would be:

1. Add only San Diego State

2. Add no new teams (unless they lose two more)

3. Add both San Diego State and Memphis

4. Add four or more

Stew, it seems in most cases traditional top-brand football schools are not at the same marquee level in men’s basketball and vice versa. Rank the top-five schools that you think are “blue bloods” in both football and basketball. — Rob W., Columbia, S.C.

Thank you. I am headed to Sacramento for the day Thursday, bought cheap tickets on SeatGeek, and it occurred to me, this may be the first time I’ve attended a college sporting event purely as a spectator since … ? I will report back how this compares with credential life.

There’s not much overlap between the two sports in terms of straight-up blue bloods. While several of my 10 Kings in college football have had recent hoops success, none would be considered among the Kings of that sport, like Duke, Kansas, Kentucky and North Carolina. Perhaps the better exercise is: How many football kings would at least be barons in men’s basketball?

Without taking the time to rank 80 or so basketball programs, I feel confident it would be these four:

Michigan: The Wolverines won a national championship in 1989, played in the final in 2013 and 2018, and the legacy of the Fab Five alone gives the program some lasting brand power.

Ohio State: The Buckeyes have lost some luster lately but had a heck of a run under Thad Matta, make the tournament regularly and have produced the likes of Jerry Lucas, Jim Jackson, Mike Conley and Evan Turner.

Oklahoma: The Sooners have had enough pockets of glory — Stacey King/Mookie Blaylock era, the Blake Griffin era, the Buddy Hield/Trae Young era — to make the cut.

Texas: Maybe it’s because the Horns play on Big Monday seemingly every week, but the program seems respected for having made one Final Four since the tourney expanded.

I’d also note there’s one basketball King that’s also a football Baron: Michigan State.

When you’re talking about TV contracts and realignment, you often reference games that had 4 million or more viewers, and how the majority of those games are Big Ten or SEC games. What are “big” numbers for an NCAA basketball game, and who is the biggest draw? What are the most watched games? Duke-UNC and who? — Brent W.

There was a weird aberration this year where the most-watched game of the season was technically a DePaul-Creighton game on Fox on Christmas Day (2.99 million), but that’s because it came on right after an NFL game (Packers-Dolphins). This makes you wonder how often these all-important Nielsen ratings are a product of people mindlessly leaving their TVs on.

The two Duke-UNC games are generally the Ohio State-Michigan of basketball on TV. This year they drew 2.86 million and 2.63 million viewers, great for basketball but about 15-20 percent of a typical Buckeyes-Wolverines football game (17.1 million last year). Big Ten basketball games also do well because so many are on CBS; this year Indiana appeared in three of the seven regular-season games that reached 2 million.

To give you a sense of more “typical” regular-season audiences, SBJ reported the following averages in 2022-23. CBS: 1.32 million. ESPN: 955,000. Fox (which added a Saturday primetime game this year): 963,000. ESPN2: 299,000. The CBS and Fox numbers are roughly 20 percent of their regular-season college football numbers, which lines up exactly with the often-cited realignment stat that basketball accounts for about 20 percent of a league’s TV contract.

But those numbers ramp up big-time come the NCAA tournament. A Duke-Michigan State second-round game last year on CBS drew 11.2 million viewers, higher than any college football conference championship or non-College Football Playoff bowl game last season. The North Carolina-St. Peter’s Elite Eight game got 13.6 million, about the same as last fall’s No. 1 Georgia vs. No. 3 Tennessee football game. And the Kansas-North Carolina national title game notched 18.1 million, which beat the (admittedly anticlimactic) Georgia-TCU CFP title game (17.2 million).

Needless to say, CBS/Turner gets a nice ROI on a contract that the NCAA, in ACC-esque fashion, extended all the way out to 2032 a few years ago and currently pays a little under $900 million per year.

With one year of varied results, what are the realistic expectations for these big-name head coaches entering their second years with their respective programs: Oklahoma’s Brent Venables, Miami’s Mario Cristobal, Oregon’s Dan Lanning, USC’s Lincoln Riley, LSU’s Brian Kelly and Notre Dame’s Marcus Freeman. — Logan T.

Venables: I knew the transition from Riley to Venables would be rough; I didn’t think it would be that rough. But with an established QB in Dillon Gabriel, a defense that should understand the system better and some impact transfers, there’s no reason OU can’t improve by several wins. I wouldn’t rule out a Big 12 title game appearance.

Cristobal: It may take longer for Cristobal to dig out of his Year 1 ditch after the Canes not only went 5-7 but the head coach already had to blow up his staff. I don’t get the sense there’s a lot of high-end talent on hand. A realistic Year 2 expectation may be just getting back above .500.

Lanning: I know Bo Nix is back, but Oregon lost a lot on its offensive line and the defense was bad last year. I don’t expect the Ducks to be considerably better. However, they went 10-3, and the two conference losses were by three points (to Washington) and four points (to Oregon State), so it’s not unrealistic that they win 10 games again.

Riley: This one’s simple. It’s realistic to expect a CFP berth. Reminder, USC was tied 17-17 with Utah at halftime of a Pac-12 Championship Game that, had it won, would have gotten Riley there in Year 1. Then Caleb Williams got hurt and the defense imploded. Williams is back, and the defense can’t possibly be worse.

Kelly: LSU overachieved in Year 1 by getting to 10 wins and a division title. It’s possible the Tigers could regress to the mean in his second season, but with QB Jayden Daniels back and with a whole lot of studs on defense, the realistic expectation to me is getting back to Atlanta and possibly getting into the final four.

Freeman: Notre Dame was all over the map in his first season, but landing standout Wake Forest QB Sam Hartman raises expectations considerably in Year 2. Assuming the Irish still have their usual strong running game and defense, the realistic bar should be a Top 10 season.

Over/under 1.5 years until Coach Prime makes the top 25 coaches list? — Kevin S., Columbus, Ohio

Over. I’ve never ranked anyone off one season as an FBS head coach. Though if he somehow took a 1-11 team to the CFP this year, I’d probably have to make an exception.

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Are you going to run the “State of the Program” series this offseason? I was hoping you’d move to cover all 130 FBS teams for 2023. — Richard F.

I must regretfully inform you of the opposite. State of the Program had a great five-year run, and I know many of you loved them, but those stories are a lot of work for our reporters, and unfortunately, readership for them tapered off. Like a coach on the hot seat, we gave SOTP one more chance in 2022, and unfortunately, it performed the equivalent of 6-6 with a trip to the Birmingham Bowl.

That being said, our reporters are hard at work on several other special series we will be rolling out over the next several months and are confident every one of you will want to read.

When it expands, what is going to be the CFP equivalent of having a West Region game in Albany, NY between Saint Mary’s and VCU? — Jesse K., Pittsfield, Mass.

I don’t think there are going to be “pods” or “regions,” so that may lessen some confusion. But we already get some of the weird geographic placement, don’t we? I will never forget the sight of Alabama and Clemson fans walking down Tasman Road in Santa Clara, California, to attend the 2018 CFP Championship Game. Alabama and Georgia in Indianapolis wasn’t the most natural fit, either. And the semifinal bowl rotation has given us the likes of Ohio State-Clemson in Arizona (twice) and Georgia-Oklahoma in Pasadena.

Under the current plan, four of the current New Year’s Six bowls will host the four quarterfinals, with preference given to traditional conference-bowl partners when possible. In other words, if Ohio State is the No. 1 seed and the Rose Bowl is a quarterfinal site, the Buckeyes would go to Pasadena. If Alabama is No. 2 and the Sugar Bowl is a site, the Tide go to New Orleans. But there are no traditional partners for the Cotton (R.I.P, Southwest Conference), Fiesta or Peach bowls, so we will likely see more than a few, say, Tennessee-Florida State Fiesta Bowls where you’re like: “Why couldn’t they have just played this in Atlanta?”

A group of us have been traveling to see a college football game/experience going on 15 years now. We have seen all of the heavy hitters (majority SEC) but this year decided to change it up and chose Nebraska. All of us are from Philly, with a few Temple alums, so with Matt Rhule there, we felt it was a good time to see a proud program with a little freshness. Have you covered a game at Nebraska and is there any chance the experience gives us anything close to what we are used to experiencing with Saturdays in the South? — Jim C.

Absolutely. The Sea of Red is truly impressive, and the fans are incredibly hospitable. Tell them you’re visiting for the first time and you’ll be treated like royalty.

And if you call the football office and tell them a bunch of Philly guys are coming, Rhule himself may pick you up at the airport.

(Top photo of Dillon Gabriel: Nathan Ray Seebeck / USA Today)