Just in case you’ve been in your Big 12 bomb shelter and missed the news, the war is over. Dan Beebe — no, seriously, Dan Beebe — won the day and saved the conference with the remaining 10 teams by coming out at the eleventh hour with promises of massive television contracts in 2011.

“What happened here yesterday was the most positive news that our league could’ve possibly got,” Bill Self said, “but even more so, from a selfish standpoint, the University of Kansas could’ve had.”

But the question now must be posed: What’s next for Kansas?

First and foremost, it can stop worrying about winding up outside a BCS conference. Second, it will drastically alter the Kansas schedule in both football and basketball, starting with the 2011 season.

Football

In football, instead of breaking the remaining 10 schools into two divisions like the Big 12 always has, each school will play all the others, expanding the conference schedule from eight to nine games.

Instead of having years off, the Jayhawks will face conference powers Texas and Oklahoma every year. When the Jayhawks took advantage of a schedule lacking appearances by either the Longhorns or Sooners in 2008 and made an incredible run to the Orange Bowl, they’ll have to work their way past every school in the conference — not just a chosen few.

It will make new coach Turner Gill’s job a little more difficult. After all, the Jayhawks are a combined 29-76 against those two schools in football. Gill, as is his style, focused on the positives of the situation — most notably, the ability to recruit prospect-laden Texas more than ever.

“It’s a great opportunity for parents to see their son play two to three times for sure a year,” Gill said. “Then you talk about their whole career and it gets up into the four to six times. So it gives a great opportunity for people in Texas to see their son and not have to travel a whole lot.”

Basketball

In basketball, the conference schedule will be a double round robin format, with each team playing a home-and-home series against all the others. It’s an attractive option because each school will visit every other every season, letting some of the conference powers, for example Texas and Kansas, develop deeper rivalries.

Big 12 Commissioner Dan Beebe expressed excitement at the concept of schools hosting the conference’s basketball powers every year.

“Certainly Kansas has had a lot of success,” Beebe said. “There’s a lot of excitement about having a team like Kansas come to your arena every year.”

It’s also notable that the defection of Colorado and Nebraska made the conference a noticeably stronger basketball conference. Nine of the remaining 10 schools at least received votes for the top 25 last season, and seven were ranked at some point during the year.

Even Self noted that the conference would be stronger without the downtrodden — in a basketball sense, at least — pair.

“I think we’re better off than we’ve ever been,” Self said. “And that’s not taking anything away from Nebraska and Colorado, but we’re a true league now. How many leagues in the country get the chance to really play for a true championship in the BCS?”

But Kansas still remains the team to beat in basketball, and the top contenders remain in conference to try to do so.

So Kansas’ world will change because of conference realignment. But only slightly. And the Big 12 is still home.