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Utah's move to the Pac-12 is going to make the Utes rich on TV money. BYU's move to independence is making the Cougars a lot richer than they were in the Mountain West.

Utah State, however, resides below the poverty line. And therein lies a fundamental flaw in college sports.

Next season, Utah will get at least 75 times more TV revenue than USU. Maybe 120 times more. And the Utes will be getting only a 50 percent share of Pac-12 money.

Let that sink in.

There's talk that the six BCS football conferences will form their own division apart from Division 1 FBS. The fact is that it's already happened.

Next year, those six conferences will bring in $1 billion combined from their TV deals. That's a conservative estimate that could be a couple hundred million dollars low.

Here are BCS conference-by-conference estimates for the 2012-13 year:

Big Ten • $236 million/$19.7 million per school

Pac-12 • $225 million/$18.75 million per school

Big 12 • $150 million/$15 million per school

SEC • $205 million/$14.6 million per school

ACC • $155 million/$12.9 million per school

Big East • $40 million/$3.2 million per football school/$1.6 million per basketball school

That Pac-12 number is extremely conservative. It doesn't include the league's six regional networks, which launch in 2012 and could add another $12 million per team each year.

(Utah gets a 50 percent share in 2012; 75 percent in 2012; and a full share beginning in 2014.)

And all those numbers are fluid. Conferences are renegotiating deals based on changing membership.

Even though the Big East is losing Syracuse, Pitt and West Virginia, the league will still most likely get more money because its deal is the next to come up for bid. And even though the Big East lags far behind the other five BCS leagues, it's still well ahead of what USU can hope to make.

The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported that the WAC, which made $4 million from its ESPN deal last year, took a 75-percent cut in the wake of Boise State's departure. That's $125,000 per team — .07 percent of the worst-case scenario/.04 percent of a best-case scenario of a full Pac-12 share.

Forget not being on the same playing field, that's not the same playing universe. And yet Utah and USU both compete in Division 1 FBS? Does that sound in the least bit sane?

If Boise State and Air Force leave the Mountain West for the Big East and the MWC adds USU and San Jose State, the best-case scenario there would be for the MWC to maintain its $12 million/$1.2 million per team. That would be 6.7 percent of a worst-case-scenario Pac-12 share — and only slightly less insane.

A lot remains up in the air. What happens with the conflicting MWC/Conference USA TV contracts if the leagues combine for football? What happens if C-USA loses Houston, SMU and Central Florida to the Big East?

What will the Big East look like? Will BYU join? Would the Cougars have to take a TV pay cut if they do join?

Neither BYU nor ESPN has ever released financial terms of their eight-year football deal, and estimates range from $5 million-$15 million per year. Of course, athletic director Tom Holmoe declared, "This is not about money" when BYU declared independence.

But how is it not about money when some teams are getting more than 100 times as much of it as others?

Scott D. Pierce covers television for The Salt Lake Tribune. His sports on TV column runs Mondays and Wednesdays. Contact him at spierce@sltrib.com, follow him on Twitter @ScottDPierce; read his blog at sltrib.com/blogs/tv.