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BY DAN WOLKEN TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 2011
GRAPEVINE, Texas — They spoke in hushed tones and huddled in groups. They ran to corners to answer cell phones, trying to hide in plain sight. They shook hands, told jokes and gossiped about the state of their industry. It probably didn’t look much different than any other gathering of NCAA athletic directors.

But these are different, more suspicious times in college sports. If the last month has taught us anything about the men and women who gathered just outside Dallas yesterday for their annual meetings, it’s believe nothing and trust no one.

Two years ago, Oklahoma athletic director Joe Castiglione and UCLA athletic director Dan Guerrero could’ve had a conversation in a hotel lobby without anyone giving it a second thought. Now, the mind churns with possibilities about what they might’ve been discussing.

When Air Force athletic director Hans Mueh sits outside on a bench all by himself, furiously typing emails on his Blackberry, you wonder if he’s in the process of bringing a service academy in Colorado to the Big East.

And when an assistant athletic director from South Florida greets a friend by calling her, “the woman who can get us into the ACC,” it’s fair to wonder if it was a flirtatious joke or a cry for help.

“The mood’s OK,” said one athletic director at a school that has been heavily involved in the realignment chaos. “There’s a certain amount of disappointment at the way this thing has transpired.”

No kidding.

College athletics may not be heading toward superconferences, may not be undergoing the massive tectonic shift that has seemed imminent twice now in the past 16 months. But that doesn’t mean things are now stable or that pandemonium has been averted for long.

Because while NCAA president Mark Emmert was here yesterday delivering what was described by multiple sources as an aggressive rebuke of the behavior that has led to so much uncertainty in college athletics, it was impossible not to notice how much healing is yet to take place.

“It’s going to take some time, undoubtedly,” Castiglione said.

Practically everybody here acknowledges that conference realignment, and in particular the way it has unfolded, is hurting college athletics to the core. Rivalries are being destroyed, financial incentives are trumping geographic alliances and the way colleges deal with each other has become uncivil and deceitful.

And yet, when it comes to putting the trust back in college athletics? Nobody’s even bothering to pretend it will happen any time soon. Texas A&M going to the SEC, the Big 12 staying together after the Oklahoma schools flirted with the Pac 10, Pittsburgh and Syracuse jumping to the ACC; none of that settled anything. It only put more athletic directors on edge, more administrators under pressure to get their school into a better conference once the insanity stops.

“We saw the potential for people to act more out of fear and misinformation than thoughtful good information,” Emmert told The Daily in an interview following his speech. “Clearly there’s been an erosion of trust and collegiality that’s very disappointing to see. But this group understands they can’t be successful unless they find ways to cooperate and collaborate. So I’m optimistic about it going forward, but there’s no question it caused some real tearing at the fabric of the collegiality.”

But Emmert isn’t part of the solution. In fact, he can’t be part of the solution, which is why the wheels of mistrust will continue to churn. He can lecture athletic directors all he wants about the way they should behave, but the NCAA is not an organization that governs the way schools group themselves together.

In other words, when East Carolina athletic director Terry Holland spends practically all of the five-hour session yesterday outside the conference room, politicking to get his school into a BCS Conference instead of listening to Emmert’s reform agenda, that’s all you need to know about where the priorities are.

The truth is, while athletic directors praised some of Emmert’s proposals like full cost of attendance scholarships and simplifying the rulebook — “He’s a sharp guy; he’s got a tough job,” Mississippi State’s Scott Stricklin said — the real intrigue here is still about realignment past, present and future.

Will Missouri re-commit to the Big 12? Can the Big East survive this onslaught by adding Air Force and Navy as football-only members, or is there a better solution available? Will West Virginia and Louisville jump to the Big 12 if they get the chance? And what to make of TCU, which is supposed to go to the Big East next year, but now could end up in the Big 12 or perhaps even back to the Mountain West.

Who to believe? Who to trust? Even when they’re all under one roof, nobody knows for sure.

“It’s still fairly collegial — as long as people are being truthful. That’s the part that has been lost a little bit,” said Mountain West Conference commissioner Craig Thompson. “[Athletic directors] forget that everybody knows somebody, and a lot of people know a lot of folks. So when they’re talking out of both sides of their mouth, it ultimately gets back to what is really being said. People need to be a little smarter.”

For the last few weeks, college administrators have done nothing but put knives in each others’ backs. Maybe this meeting will start the healing. More likely, it’s just a chance to lie face-to-face.