The way this ended up has nothing to do with conference politics or an ESPN slight. It's the logical outcome of the current contract structure between the B12 broadcast partners.

ESPN and Fox have a contractual agreement in how weekly games are selected. They alternate who makes the first selection on a weekly basis with ESPN holding the option to pick first in week one or defer that selection to week two.Once the week one decision to pick or defer is made the cadence is set for the rest of the season. ESPN opted to select first in week one so they could broadcast the Texas vs Notre Dame game. In doing so they locked in having first choice in the odd numbered weeks. Since Texas vs OU is in week six Fox had first choice and of course selected that game.

Bottom line: ESPN valued Texas/Notre Dame more than Texas/Oklahoma

BTW, great post on expansion.