Here’s an SBNation article based on a couple of recent reports that I hadn’t seen (SIAP).
UConn’s Plan B if left out of Big 12 expansion: Rejoin Big East in all sports except football. Jettison AAC, pursue football-only in MAC, MWC, C-USA or Sun Belt (!).
Report indicates mutual interest between UConn, Big East
It seems like a desperation Plan B, but I could think of a few reasons they’d consider it (appeal of rejoining Big East in basketball is an obvious upside).
Fox pays the Big East about $42 million a year for the rights to its basketball programming, or $4.2 mil per school. You would think that number could only increase by adding UConn basketball.
The American's deal with ESPN for both football and basketball pays $1.5 million per school. Someone might read this and think "They also have a deal with CBS", but the games on CBSSN are licensed to CBS by ESPN. The AAC's deal with ESPN is much worse than the schools expected, I think.
So UConn dumping the AAC to get in the Big East and then finding a convenient home for football would both (1) raise its basketball profile and (2) make it a good deal more money from media rights.