Texas is adding some panache to its new conference. The Longhorns, who officially joined the Southeastern Conference on Monday, just dove headfirst into the most exciting football league around and will bring its own brand of swag to the proceedings.

Beverly Hills is joining college football’s resident Beverly Hillbillies.

SEC commissioner Greg Sankey welcomed UT into the conference near the conclusion of Sunday’s SEC Celebration on the South Mall.

His league’s football success over the last two decades has been built on a cool catchphrase: It Just Means More. If results are proof, it certainly does.

More: What the Longhorns (and others) said at the SEC Celebration

UT Board of Regents Chairman Kevin Eltife, standing on the Tower stage with Sankey, UT President Jay Hartzell and athletic director Chris Del Conte minutes before Pit Bull rocked the house, left no doubt as to how it will go down in Texas’ new conference, extending a passionate invitation to Longhorns fans for the upcoming sports year.

“I hope we see you all at Moody, Disch-Falk, DKR and all of our sporting events,” Eltife roared to the well-lathered crowd. "We need you there. You come find me. I’ll buy you a beer. We’ll put it on (athletic director Chris) Del Conte’s tab!”

Sankey's welcome was merely the appetizer.

More: With Texas now in the SEC, Longhorn Network resets with a new look, plan and streaming app

A huge roar went up and the beer men assembled rolled up their sleeves as the lines grew in the seconds that followed.

Buckle up and get ready for a wild ride.

Texas already was one of the most lucrative athletic departments around and a successful one on the field as three Learfield Directors' Cup wins in the last four years will attest, but it’s impossible to overstate that certain, sexy allure that comes with the big steer joining the best collection of football teams in the business.

And make no mistake about it, this is business.

Like them or not, the Longhorns are box office. They print money like Jeff Bezos, spend it like his ex-wife and have no problem reminding you they’re a football blue blood housed in the nation’s 11th largest city.

More: Longhorns prepare to join SEC, and football will take center stage | Golden

This SEC partnership will prove fruitful, no doubt. The league is getting an athletic department that grossed more than $270 million in revenue this past fiscal year, which was a few dozen safe deposit boxes ahead of second-place Ohio State. Del Conte has already raised funds for a new $90 million indoor football practice facility and Moody Center, UT's multipurpose venue, has already shown that it’s one of the coolest basketball/concert arenas in the country.

The ability to generate revenue, situated in a destination city and with an athletic department being run by arguably the best AD in the business made the move to partner up an obvious one.

The Horns and Oklahoma Sooners had to align with the big boys and vice versa. Credibility is everything for a league that was already bringing in boatloads of cash before it expanded. The Sooners had a better go of it in football during the Big 12 years, but it was never happening for them in the SEC without Texas. The Horns have the money, the high profile and did I mention the money?

When we all got the news three summers ago that the Red River rivals were leaving arm in arm for greener southeastern pastures, the reaction was polarizing because of how it all went down. As it turns out, it was a master business stroke with football leading the way.

“It’s the singular biggest moment in the history of the conference,” said ESPN personality Paul Finebaum, who has covered the conference for over 40 years.

Of course, this power move was football driven. The SEC owns the sport and the south is king, despite what folks in Ann Arbor might be saying. Michigan’s CFP championship win over Washington was amazingly the first time an SEC team failed to reach the title game since Ohio State beat Oregon for the 2014 crystal ball.

So don’t get it twisted. The national championship still runs through places like Athens, Baton Rouge, Tuscaloosa and, if Steve Sarkisian’s team continues to surge upward, Austin. Those are all great towns, but you don’t have to tell me those fan bases aren’t already excited about a future road trip to the 512. Breakfast tacos, Sixth Street and a date with Bevo. Who wouldn’t want to be on the right side of that velvet rope?

The party starts in Austin

A humid afternoon gave way to a much more bearable evening Sunday. Fireworks from the Tower soon filled the sky as 30,000 well-hydrated students, fans and alumni anticipated Pit Bull’s free concert, but not before hearing from the university’s holy trinity. Hartzell, Eltife and Del Conte were the ones who met with Sankey, OU athletic director Joe Castiglione and OU president Joseph Harroz in 2021 to talk about a merging of ideals and football teams.

“It’s a real match,” Sankey said. "To witness this turnout and to experience the enthusiasm ... it's been amazing." Then he capped his welcome address by firing Smokey the Cannon.

It’s already a smashing success because the Longhorns, who were fresh off a 5-7 nightmare the season before that meeting of power brokers, have gone 20-6 under Sarkisian the last two years, including a Big 12 championship and its first CFP appearance in 2023.

The other sports are thriving, by the way.

“We live where our feet are,” said Del Conte, who was sporting a golf shirt with the new conference’s logo. “We decided not to put ‘SEC’ anywhere until today. We’re going to celebrate today and turn the page tomorrow and get to work.”

The work will be there, particularly in football where a certain fan base in College Station — one that was surely against Texas’ inclusion before the group dynamic won it — will be counting down the days until the Horns arrive for four quarters of blood-and-guts gridiron warfare on Thanksgiving weekend.

Bevo XV is certainly looking forward to the meeting as evidenced by his shiny maroon poop bucket adorned with a Texas A&M logo. And don’t forget top-ranked Georgia, whose last bowl loss came to Texas in the Sugar Bowl in 2019, and Arkansas, which would like nothing more than to give Texas a second consecutive Fayetteville beatdown on Nov. 16.

“We will revive old rivalries and start new ones,” Hartzell said. “And we’re not just coming to compete. We are coming to win.”

Texas quarterback Quinn Ewers believes the Horns will be everybody’s biggest game, and he may be right. As for four conference home games, you can expect Royal-Memorial Stadium to be packed and rocking.

And don’t be shocked to see more road fans attempting to go beyond their school’s road ticket allotment to somehow find their way into the building.

Texas and the SEC.

It’s a party we can’t afford to miss.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Why the SEC aligning with Texas' cachet was inevitable