i agree with the alumni population angle to a degree. i can't speak with much personal experience to the academic question since (as you say) that's largely administrative stuff and there's a significant disconnect most of the time between administrators/PR people/economists who sit in Regents and in-class instruction/faculty. peer groups for institutions would be a function of salaries and job stability (which have been bad at CU vs. peer institutions but is improving)....which directly i'm not sure would be something that's guaranteed. talking outside the more alums see games or better TV deals=more money for CU argument=better for CU academics (which i'm not sure is as automatic as many football fans like to think.....)...faculty hires and peer associations have very little to do with sports conference affiliations.
in the realm of perception, the association with the Pac would bring some elevated sense of academic "rank".....but, the Pac has some out of the US News top 100 schools as well. off the top of my head: WSU, OSU, Oregon and the Arizona schools are significantly lower than CU or ATM if i recall. obviously, Cal, Stanford, UCLA, and (lately) USC are excellent schools. but, to me, a lot of that has to do with population density as a concentration in one conference more than anything. Iowa State is ranked higher than half the conference i'd wager.
with the caveat that the US News ranking is a questionable (but accessible) measure in such matters. and CU was considered along with UNC, UVA, Uw-Madison, Mich, Texas 25 years ago as a smaller, gentler version of Cal-Berkeley: as a so-called "Public Ivy". when we were in the Big 8, hardly a towering set of academic schools. since then, CU's rep seems to have dropped in to the Iowa, UCSD, type area. these are fine schools with areas of emphasis or departments that are equal to any university nationally, no slam intended.
Good post.
Certainly the Pac Ten isn't as "exclusive" as the Big Ten when it comes to academics. Arizona is a very solid school, however, but Wazzu, ASU, Oregon State all have a long way to go. CU would fit into the Washington/Cal/AZ range as far as demographics and academics.
One interesting facet to the conversation could be Hawai'i. While they certainly aren't a "Stanford" academically, the university has an extremely large endowment, solid academics (at least on par with Wazzu/ASU/OrState). While the travel costs might prove to be prohibitive, the new Pac Ten commish has stated numerous times that they see extremey opportunity to grow the Pac Ten brand international, specifically to Southeast Asia. Adding Hawai'i from a marketability standpoint in that regard could be huge. Obviously that is a real long shot, and no sources have identified any such interest, but if there is any conference that could overcome the travel costs to Hawai'i, it would be the Pac Ten.
Adding a 12th team would then be very difficult, of course.
Another strategy for the Big 12 Conference would be to make the "preemptive strike" to protect against any Big Ten/Pac Ten expansion into their territory. How about the Big 14! The name is already under trademark by the Big 12 Conference, adding BYU and Utah to the Big 12 would completely emasculate any Pac Ten expansion, and protect against Mizzou or another school joining the Big Ten. Also cutting out the MWC's ability to gain "BCS status" would protect their long-term market share along the front range.
While being "defensive" isn't the best reason, adding BYU/Utah to the Big 12 would have many benefits by itself. Both schools offer competitive programs in many sports and the Big 12 isn't as "high and mighty" about the academic freedom issue to prevent BYU from joining.
Not sure how division breakdowns would work, maybe:
WEST...............EAST
Texas...............Oklahoma
Texas A&M.......Nebraska
Texas Tech.......Missouri
Baylor...............Iowa State
Colorado...........Oklahoma State
Utah.................Kansas
Brigham Young..Kansas State
I know, I know, this could go on and on forever, but the "Big 14" could be a way for the Big 12 to avoid "self-implosion" by having their programs cherry-picked by the Big Ten and Pac Ten.