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Oklahoma football: How ESPN’s Power Index ranks Big 12 ahead of 2023 season

By Chip Rouse

POLAND - 2021/02/09: In this photo illustration, a ESPN logo seen displayed on a smartphone with a pen, key, book and headsets in the background. (Photo Illustration by Mateusz Slodkowski/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
POLAND - 2021/02/09: In this photo illustration, a ESPN logo seen displayed on a smartphone with a pen, key, book and headsets in the background. (Photo Illustration by Mateusz Slodkowski/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images) /
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The 2023 college football season will be the final one in the Big 12 for the Oklahoma football program after a long and fruitful marriage.

The Sooners have won 50 conference championships and seven national championships as members of the Big 12 Conference and all of its forerunners. This season marks the beginning of a total transformation of the Big 12 since its expansion from eight to 12 members in 1996. Only eight of the founding members remain in the conference, and after OU and Texas leave for the SEC after this season that original number will be down to six.

Four new teams (BYU, Cincinnati, Houston and Central Florida (UCF) have joined the Big 12 for this season, and after another round of interconference musical chairs this past week, four more (Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado and Utah) are set to enter the league in the 2024 season, expanding the Big 12’s geographical footprint from middle America through two western time zones.

It’s a new look for sure for everybody in the Big 12, but despite all the change, the ESPN College Football Power Index still views Texas and Oklahoma as the lead contenders for the conference title as they begin their swan-song season as members of the Big 12.

Based on the initial rankings of the 2023 ESPN FPI, Texas (5) and Oklahoma (11) have the highest probability of winning the Big 12 this season and landing one final insult in what has been a two-year farewell tour for both schools.

As a reminder, the ESPN Football Power Index, in the words of its founders, “is a measure of team strength that is meant to be the best predictor of a team’s performance going forward for the rest of the season.”

The rest of the Big 12 lines up like this, based on the 2023 preseason FPI rankings:

5. Texas Longhorns

11. Oklahoma Sooners

17. TCU Horned Frogs

22. Texas Tech Red Raiders

23. Baylor Bears

26. UCF Knights

27. Kansas State Wildcats

38. Oklahoma State Cowboys

43. Iowa State Cyclones

48. Cincinnati Bearcats

54. Houston Cougars

57. West Virginia Mountaineers

60. BYU Cougars

68. Kansas Jayhawks

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