If you cover college sports for ESPN, you’ve got a real problem right now.

The biggest story these days is the conference realignment that’s bringing tectonic shifts to the NCAA landscape, ending century-old rivalries, and setting longtime partners at each others’ throats.

Problem is, ESPN itself is at the heart of why this is happening. Its Longhorn Network deal with the University of Texas kicked off the mess, sending Texas A&M to the SEC because they’re so mad about the deal, which gives Texas $300 million over twenty years, puts a conference game on the network, and wants to show high school games and highlights (ever seen a ticked-off Aggie? It’s not pretty). The idea of a school-only network played a role last year in sending the Nebraska Cornhuskers to the Big Ten. That helped lead Colorado to leave for the Pac-12 and left the Big 12 near death, having lost a quarter of its members, including two premier ones. The instability in the Big 12 and movement toward superconferences surely played a part in the ACC’s recent raiding of the Big East’s Pittsburgh and Syracuse.

The near-destruction of the Big 12 sent Oklahoma scurrying to the Pac-12 in the hopes of finding stability in the west with Oklahoma State, Texas, and Texas Tech (don’t ask me why OU, my alma mater, still wants to be in a league with UT, but that’s another story). On Tuesday, the Pac-12 said no thanks, in no small part because it was “appalled” at Texas, which insisted on retaining its $300 million TV deal with ESPN.

How has ESPN covered its own role in the fiasco this week? Poorly.

Here’s Pat Forde’s top yesterday:

In an ideal world, Oklahoma and Texas would return to the Big 12 fold today with heightened humility. They would be freshly thankful for the company they keep. They would pledge to be good working partners with their peers.

Since this is the real world, not the ideal, I assume the chances of that happening are slim.

But the Sooners and Longhorns can at least be encouraged to show some dignity, class and respect to their conference brethren. After threatening to take their talents and problematic TV network to the Pac-12, the Atlantic Coast Conference and everywhere else but South Beach, they’ve really got nowhere else to go but back home.

You’ve embarrassed yourselves and your conference, and now must backpedal faster than Deion Sanders. Your egos and attitudes have helped create a chain-reaction panic from coast to coast. Your infighting needs to end.

Imagine if The Wall Street Journal reported that a hacking scandal had roiled Britain and failed to note News Corp.’s role in it. That’s analogous to what’s happening in this column. ESPN’s network is/was the core issue in the Big 12 turmoil.

That kind of coverage doesn’t deviate much from the ESPN corporate line, which goes like this:

The driving force on realignment lies with the conferences and universities. The Big 12 determined in 2010 to grant each of its schools the ability to create their own networks. As a result, the Big 12 stayed together and the University of Texas made the decision to launch its network. ESPN subsequently won a competitive bid to become its media partner. We have since seen Kansas State and Missouri create opportunities while Oklahoma is exploring its media options. The concept of LHN remains the same as it was 15 months ago.‬

At least Forde mentioned a “TV network,” though. Ivan Meisel Maisel doesn’t note that angle at all:

The arson inspectors will decide in due time what set off this conflagration. It may have been the arrogance of Texas, or the inability of Texas A&M to deal with that arrogance (you’d think if anyone knew how …). But once the Aggies threw up their hands and began talking to the SEC, they set off an emotional chain reaction that only now has begun to calm.

Ted Miller’s Pac-12 blog post doesn’t mention the Longhorn Network sticking point either, much less ESPN’s role in the mess.

Andy Katz mentions the Longhorn Network, but doesn’t note that his employer owns it.

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