<P> On June 15, 2010, a deal was reached between Texas and the Big 12 Conference to keep Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, Oklahoma, and Oklahoma State in the Big 12 . Following Texas' decision, the other Big 12 schools that had been rumored candidates to join the Pac - 10 announced they would remain in the Big 12 . This deal effectively ended the Pac - 10's ambition to potentially become a sixteen - team conference . </P> <P> On June 17, 2010, the University of Utah officially accepted an invitation to join the Pac - 10 Conference, effective starting July 2011 . Utah was a member of the Western Athletic Conference (WAC) with Arizona and Arizona State before those two left for the Pac - 10 in 1978 . The Utes left an expanded WAC with seven other schools in 1999 to form the new Mountain West Conference . Utah became the first "BCS Buster" to join a BCS conference, having played in (and won) two BCS games beforehand . </P> <P> On July 27, 2010, the conference unveiled a new logo and announced that the Pac - 10 would be renamed the Pac - 12 when Utah and Colorado formally joined in July 2011 . On October 21, the Pac - 12 announced that its football competition would be split into two divisions--a North Division comprising the Pacific Northwest and Bay Area schools, and a South Division comprising the Mountain Time Zone and Southern California schools . On July 1, 2011, the Pac - 12 assumed its current alignment when both Colorado and Utah officially joined as full members . </P> <P> On August 15, 2012, the conference debuted the Pac - 12 Network . It was the third college sports conference to launch a dedicated network, and the first to completely fund and own their own network outright . </P>

When did the pac 10 become the pac 12