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Pac-12 Info

Much More Than Athletics

The newly named Pac-12 is perhaps known primarily as one of the country's elite collegiate athletic conferences with a storied history of on-field excellence. Before its name change, the Pac-10 led the nation in NCAA Championships in 44 of the last 50 years, and if the Pac-12 as it now stands were its own nation, its athletes would have placed 5th in the 2008 Summer Olympic Games medal count.

But the Pac-12 represents much more than schools with impressive athletic pedigrees; its universities are among the most recognizable higher educational brands in the world and comprise THE flagship research universities of the West—with a combination of over 130 Nobel Laureates, over 40 Pulitzer Prize winners, and an impressive number of technological patents and businesses generated from the commercialization of home-grown innovation. Visit the Pac-12 Conference Website

"If not for the U's performance in the classrooms and laboratories, this partnership would not have formed. I know from my years at the helm of the California system of higher education that Pac-10 schools place a great deal of emphasis on broad-based academic excellence, just as Utah does. The invitation extended to the (University of Utah) to join the Pac-10 is the most recent evidence of...a tangible expression of regard by other distinguished universities of the successes and accomplishments of the state's flagship public university. The U's Pac-10 affiliation is based on more than athletic prowess; it is also an affirmation by the Pac-10 universities of the University of Utah's standing as a leading American university, also a condition for Pac-10 membership and without which judgment the invitation would never have been extended."

—David P. Gardner, president emeritus of both the University of Utah and the University of California educational system

PAC-12 School Logos

Last Updated: 3/4/24