Dennis Dodd

The easy, safe and best choice is Mizzou for multiple reasons.  MU meets all the stated requirements for a new member.
MU increases market area by gaining StL and KC markets plus Missouri has 6.5 million people and only one D1 football team plus we have some of the best facilities in the nation with a stadium that holds 71K.  MU has good academics and is a member of the AAU.  MU was ranked top 15 public schools academically per Forbes and has more research money than Indiana U and a higher endowment than Iowa.  So it wouldn't rate last in the Big 10 on two major categories.  You bring in a big state school name with tradition.  Both the bball team and football team are competitive and both have been good as of late.  We fit geographically and already have a budding rivalry with Illinois who we destroyed in both bball and football this year.  Plus we think Iowa is full of hicks and has no culture or real cities.  They can be our new Kansas.  Just trying to stir the pot.   We have one of the best if not the best journalism school in the country and one of the only schools in the country with a law school, vet school, engineering school, nuc reactor and med school on the same campus.  And best of all MU would love to be in the Big 10.  Not that the Big 12 is bad, but overall MU would benefit across the board.  MU is in a good position.  Either conference will work, the Big 10 is just a better fit.  Plus MU alum incldue Brad Pitt, Sheryll Crow, John Hamm, George C. Scott, Kate Capshaw, Tom Beringer, Chris Cooper, Sam Walton, Edward Jones, the Governor of Oregon and Virginia (total random but true), Tennessee Williams, Mort Walker and name a famous journalist, i.e. Dennis Dodd.  For crying out loud the guy who wrote this article is a Mizzou grad.  We are everywhere.  The list goes on and on.  That sounds like a winner to me Big 10 country.