Instead of the Big Ten raiding the Pac-12. Merge the conferences. Pac-12 adds 4 teams or Pac-12 adds 2 and Big Ten drops 2 (and there are a couple weak teams that could go from the Big Ten). Pac-12 has the 2 western divisions. Big Ten has the 2 eastern divisions. Maybe play 11 game season with east and west championship games in week 12 (along with consolation games for other members) followed by the overall conference championship in week 13 between the champion of the old Pac-12 teams from the west and the champion of the old Big 10 teams from the east. So two championship weekends. There'd be very little long-distance travel as the east and west teams would be playing each other with little to no crossover games.
A 32 team super conference on both coasts. Make the SEC's 16 team conference look small. Have the media markets on the east and west coasts and have a single TV network to cover all of it. Payouts would be massive.
How else to compete? You can't try to keep up because you never will. You have to try to completely outflank them or do something out of the box that one-ups them. That's my idea. Wouldn't have to be the Big Ten either, could be the ACC that merges with the Pac-12.