With a Thursday vote on NCAA legislation allowing 12 regular season football games per season looming, coaches have been giving opinions on what implications the proposed change could have on the conference schedule.

While passage of the legislation is not assured, many involved in the process said they believe it is likely. Coaches around the Big 12 have jumped on board and are lobbying for changes in the conference schedule at the annual Big 12 meetings next month.

“It appears that it will happen,” Kansas State coach Bill Snyder said in a press conference. “To me it makes sense. I remember back when we played 14 or 15 games [in 2003], and our players like that.”

The Kansas City Star reported last week that both Oklahoma head coach Bob Stoops and Texas coach Mack Brown supported the proposed legislation to lengthen the season, provided the Big 12 eliminates its title game.

Stoops was unavailable for comment, and the University of Texas did not return phone calls.

The league will reportedly also consider going to nine conference games if the legislation passes.

“I’m willing to listen and talk about it, and obviously it’s one of the things that will be on agenda when we meet in Colorado Springs,” said ISU coach Dan McCarney. “Whether I support elimination of the championship game, I don’t know about that.

“I haven’t coached in that game, so I don’t know. I’ll have to listen to those who have been in the game and hear what they have to say.”

If the conference dropped the title game, a new way to determine the champion would need to be found. The most likely scenario would be to employ a system like Big Ten and Pac-10 conferences use, with no north and south divisions.

McCarney said he could see some of the concerns that would cause coaches to want the title game eliminated.

“The timing of playing another game before holidays and before bowl season, and then the possibility of what can happen to teams that lose that game, what it does to their bowl opportunities [is a concern],” McCarney said.

Other schools, like Colorado, believe there may be other motives behind coaches wanting to eliminate the title game.

Dave Plati, assistant sports information director at the University of Colorado, spoke on behalf of head coach Gary Barnett and said they are strongly against elimination of the title game.

“I’ve spoken with Gary at length on this and we definitely do not support eliminating the title game,” Plati said. “We don’t think this is something the south would have proposed five years ago when Nebraska, Kansas State and Colorado were dominating.

“Gary loves the title game and he believes the atmosphere there is better than what it is at a bowl game, so we’re totally against a non-divisional conference.”

Plati also expressed concerns over what effects a ninth conference game would have on non-conference scheduling.

“We’re happy playing [non-conference] games against regional opponents,” Plati said. “We want to have quality home-and-home series and we think nine conference games may take away from that.”

The Big 12’s annual meetings takes place next month in Colorado Springs.

The Big 12 title game has been played every year since the conference’s creation in 1996.