Burning up all over Twitter.

TCU is getting an invite to the Big 12, regardless of what Missouri does. Press conferences and announcements coming today.

Quickie analysis.

Good for TCU. This makes sense, and is where they should be. Since they had given the MWC notice of leaving the conference last year, they can be playing in the Big 12 in 2012. No waiting.

Good for Texas A&M and possibly Missouri. This assures that the conference will have at least 8 teams for 2012. That means keeping BCS bid with minimum number of teams. It makes negotiating an exit in time for 2012 easier for both teams. Still will pay plenty of money for the early exit, but conference isn’t forced to hold them.

Also good for Jamie Dixon. That is still his alma mater. I know I would have been feeling a lot of guilt if I had been the one to help facilitate the move to the Big East, only to see Pitt take the opportunity to go to the ACC. All out of his hands, but still had to be gnawing at him a bit.

Bad for Pitt and Syracuse. Since TCU will not be a member of the Big East in 2012, the Big East will be at 8 members with Pitt and Cuse. The minimum to maintain an automatic bid issue makes leaving next season almost impossible unless there are two other teams the conference can bring in by next fall. Even if Navy joins immediately (big if right now), that only takes it to 7 without Pitt and Cuse.

At this point, Pitt has to hope that Mizzou does get into the SEC; and the Big 12 goes to 12 grabbing Louisville, WVU and Cinci. Only way Pitt and Syracuse isn’t playing in the Big East next year with this news is with the complete disintegration of Big East football.

Good and bad for Big East. Obviously losing a potentially valuable addition — though it does explain the weekend leak of interest in SMU if they had an inkling of this happening — and keeps them in a precarious position. Good because while TCU doesn’t have to give 27 months notice, they still pay Big East $5 million.

Pitt has officially finalized and released its basketball schedule. That is to say, the TV stuff is established. Hope you have ESPN3.com and Pitt Panther Television if you want to watch much of this year’s non-con.

Four non-con games (not even including the exhibition games) are on Pitt Panthers TV and four are on ESPN3.com out of 13 non-cons. The other five are on various other places like Comcast-Philadelphia (Penn), CBS College Sports (Duquesne), ESPN2 (Oklahoma St.), ESPN (Tenn) and ESPNU (Wagner).

I’ve already stated that this year’s non-con is on the weak side. ESPN breaks down the individual Big East teams’ non-con schedules, and see the same thing.

Toughness scale (1-10): 1 — The Panthers won the Big East last season and return a core that could challenge for yet another title. So why not a better nonconference slate? The Panthers were expecting an ACC team to play in the Philly HoopGroup Classic but that fell through, leaving them to play host Penn. Winning at Tennessee in the SEC/Big East Challenge won’t be a walk, but the Vols will be picked in the bottom-third of the SEC. Oklahoma State is a decent opponent at the Garden, and neighboring Duquesne always play the Panthers tough. Long Beach presents a decent mid-major challenge. But as a whole, this nonconference schedule is about as bad as it gets for a top-10 program.

Pitt has done a very, very good job of non-con scheduling the last few years. A clunker happens, but this is worse because the schedule is completely devoid of any decent games at home. The few decent ones are neutral sites or away.

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