Would Notre Dame be willing to save the BE in football?

[Corp]

In a word; No!

[Water Pony]

Probably not, but BB schools only do not help ND, who has lots of non-revenue sports and needs quality competition, ala BE, B1G, etc. (BTW, I don't believe Big 12 is an option.) For the sake of argument, if they aligned for FB with the BE, with or without WVA, you could make a create win/win with national, eastern and western groups.

ND
Navy
Air Force
BYU
Cincinnati
Louisville
Rutgers
Connecticut
SMU
Houston

If you were bold, you could consider Tulane, Rice, Tulsa and Memphis for a super conference with respectable academics, which ND prefers.