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Folks are overrating the idea that performance matters in these leagues. Competitiveness matters to a degree, but it's largely about a good fit academically for some leagues and about the opportunities to maximize revenue.
These decisions aren't made by sports fans, so the fact that Rutgers was a doormat until a few minutes ago in football and still remains so in men's basketball just doesn't matter in regards to whether this deal gets consummated. (though I will point out that the basketball team is an overall winning record in a Big East where 14 of the 16 teams have them. That's just insane by any standard...and the women's program is solid and they do have strong non-revenue sports, if we're measuring "program quality.")
Big Ten officials want a school that fits academically. Penn State being the last school added should tell you about what they look for. Notre Dame notwithstanding (and their position being well elucidated..) it's not a surprise that Rutgers and Missouri rate high on the list. Both are flagship state schools. Pitt is an independent state school and they already have the flagship school for Pennsylvania in their league and Syracuse is private.
These decisions are political ones that have way more to do with the sort of pedantic things that folks in the academy care about and I assure very little of it has anything to do with win/loss records. Sure, they might let coaches into the conversations, but...no one wants to add a program to their league that they expect will dominate it. It's about other things and this decision will ultimately be made by that standard. What those standards are we can only guess, but don't be mistaken into believe it's going to be a competitive analysis, because it doesn't matter.
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