This time, we're assuming it's for real. Late Thursday night, a switch was flipped and the Big 12 website welcomed West Virginia to the conference. Considering the timing, this had to be a mistake, but we'll probably find out more on Friday.
Remember, this same sort of thing happened with the SEC and Mizzou -- numerous pages were pushed live well in advance of the official announcement. In both cases, everyone that had been paying attention knew what was coming, but the method by which things slipped out wasn't the best way to make a public relations splash.
The image was up for a very short amount of time before being pulled back down. However, reports on Thursday indicated that West Virginia has resolved its lawsuits with the Big East. The Big 12 is also scheduled to release its long-awaited 2012 football schedule on Friday. These two items are related, so we can probably call this a preview of what the Big 12 website will look like on Friday.