It's a single report, but at this point they're all worth reporting, so bear with us. According to a tweet and published report from Cincinnati's 24/7 site Bearcat Lair, the SEC has already rejected West Virginia as a potential 14th member. Bearcat Lair's Todd Cunningham tweeted that the SEC had rejected West Virginia's application and that the Big East's remaining football members were working in concert with several of the potential Big XII Conference teams left without a home to form a new conference.
Normally a formal application to a conference is a rubber stamp formality, so we're somewhat skeptical that the report is entirely true. It's conceivable that West Virginia did submit information to the SEC to at least be reviewed for consideration and their candidacy was tabled for the time being. Several media outlets have noted that West Virginia might not add much to the SEC's bottom line, not enough to go ahead and take them now without possibly considering Missouri or current ACC members. Even if the report is true, we don't consider the SEC done considering other schools and we don't consider West Virginia done being considered by other conferences.
If the remaining Big East teams hope to revitalize the Big East, or perhaps form a new BCS automatic qualifying conference, the cause would be immeasurably helped by having West Virginia on board. West Virginia is one of the premier schools in the Big East and would be a boost to the major sports in any conference. Cultural or academic issues would perhaps make it less attractive to the ACC or SEC, but Big East Coast Bias remains big fans of our friends in Morgantown. While we understand that they would be disappointed at the possibility of being rejected by the SEC, we are excited at the possibility of retaining them as conference brethren going forward.