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If I am Gloria Nevarez and the MWC Presidents, , I am on the phone with WSU, OSU and Gonzaga and SMC pronto and aligning the primary Basketball Conference in the western US today.

Current AP MBB Ranking

17 SMC
19 WSU
20 SDSU
22 USU
23 Zags

What is waiting around going to buy any of the MWC or PAC at this point?

If any of those teams were willing to join the Mountain West then they'd be in right now. Gonzaga likes what they have right now, Saint Mary's isn't really worth much. The Pac-2 schools are waiting until the Pac is officially dead to do anything.

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ProvoAggie wrote: ↑

February 28th, 2024, 3:29 pm

If any of those teams were willing to join the Mountain West then they'd be in right now. Gonzaga likes what they have right now, Saint Mary's isn't really worth much. The Pac-2 schools are waiting until the Pac is officially dead to do anything.

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Doesn't SMC play in a glorified HS gym with like 3K seats?

ViAggie wrote: ↑

February 28th, 2024, 4:05 pm

ProvoAggie wrote: ↑

February 28th, 2024, 3:29 pm

If any of those teams were willing to join the Mountain West then they'd be in right now. Gonzaga likes what they have right now, Saint Mary's isn't really worth much. The Pac-2 schools are waiting until the Pac is officially dead to do anything.

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Doesn't SMC play in a glorified HS gym with like 3K seats?

Yes, but it gets loud in there.

ViAggie wrote: ↑

February 28th, 2024, 4:05 pm

ProvoAggie wrote: ↑

February 28th, 2024, 3:29 pm

If any of those teams were willing to join the Mountain West then they'd be in right now. Gonzaga likes what they have right now, Saint Mary's isn't really worth much. The Pac-2 schools are waiting until the Pac is officially dead to do anything.

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Doesn't SMC play in a glorified HS gym with like 3K seats?

Saint Mary's is honestly the odd one out of that group. I think the only way we'd add them is if it was a package deal with Gonzaga. If we added just Gonzaga they'd have the smallest arena in the conference.

I'll never forget that kid picking his nose in against the wall while Jardine dunks over a Gael player. Classic.

Would there be anything wrong with the MWC approaching every current and potential MWC school and informing them that the MWC has minimum standards/goals..

For the health and well-being of the league, if you want to be a member of this league in good standing, there are requirements.

You need a functional 20K seat Football Stadium and we need you to be averaging 15K actual butts in seats.

And you need to have a functional 10K arena for Basketball and you need to be averaging 5k actual butts in seats.

If your team is not there, let's look at your plan to get there via facilities improvements/expansion and let's review your progress toward those plans.

That is the kind of vision/leadership the conference needs.

RogerAndersen wrote: ↑

March 1st, 2024, 5:28 pm

Would there be anything wrong with the MWC approaching every current and potential MWC school and informing them that the MWC has minimum standards/goals..

For the health and well-being of the league, if you want to be a member of this league in good standing, there are requirements.

You need a functional 20K seat Football Stadium and we need you to be averaging 15K actual butts in seats.

And you need to have a functional 10K arena for Basketball and you need to be averaging 5k actual butts in seats.

If your team is not there, let's look at your plan to get there via facilities improvements/expansion and let's review your progress toward those plans.

That is the kind of vision/leadership the conference needs.

Hawaii would be kicked out for sure, but they are just a FB only school so Maybe the new PAC13+1 will set some sort of standards that will help whip us all into shape?

I think in order for that to happen, there would have to be a fairly significant grace period. I just don’t see the conference kicking anyone out against their will.

RogerAndersen wrote: ↑

March 1st, 2024, 5:28 pm

Would there be anything wrong with the MWC approaching every current and potential MWC school and informing them that the MWC has minimum standards/goals..

For the health and well-being of the league, if you want to be a member of this league in good standing, there are requirements.

You need a functional 20K seat Football Stadium and we need you to be averaging 15K actual butts in seats.

And you need to have a functional 10K arena for Basketball and you need to be averaging 5k actual butts in seats.

If your team is not there, let's look at your plan to get there via facilities improvements/expansion and let's review your progress toward those plans.

That is the kind of vision/leadership the conference needs.

You would immediately be kicking out both Oregon State and Washington State.

The best thing that could happen to this conference is let Air Force basketball play in the summit league and sjsu drop down to fcs.

LarryTheAggie wrote: ↑

March 1st, 2024, 7:53 pm

RogerAndersen wrote: ↑

March 1st, 2024, 5:28 pm

Would there be anything wrong with the MWC approaching every current and potential MWC school and informing them that the MWC has minimum standards/goals..

For the health and well-being of the league, if you want to be a member of this league in good standing, there are requirements.

You need a functional 20K seat Football Stadium and we need you to be averaging 15K actual butts in seats.

And you need to have a functional 10K arena for Basketball and you need to be averaging 5k actual butts in seats.

If your team is not there, let's look at your plan to get there via facilities improvements/expansion and let's review your progress toward those plans.

That is the kind of vision/leadership the conference needs.

You would immediately be kicking out both Oregon State and Washington State.

I know Washington st is pretty good this year but both those programs historically have been pretty poor in bball.

RogerAndersen wrote:Would there be anything wrong with the MWC approaching every current and potential MWC school and informing them that the MWC has minimum standards/goals..

For the health and well-being of the league, if you want to be a member of this league in good standing, there are requirements.

You need a functional 20K seat Football Stadium and we need you to be averaging 15K actual butts in seats.

And you need to have a functional 10K arena for Basketball and you need to be averaging 5k actual butts in seats.

If your team is not there, let's look at your plan to get there via facilities improvements/expansion and let's review your progress toward those plans.

That is the kind of vision/leadership the conference needs.

5k is way too high. NCAA average is 4,300 whereas 15k in football is almost 1/3 the average. I'd say the line should be drawn at 1,500-2,000 butts in seats

MWC caliber schools or better that wouldn't qualify from 2022 from a quick scan of a pdf:
Air force 1,200
Cal 2,100
CSU 4,600
FAU 2,200 (seats 2,900)
NMSU 4,997
Oregon state 3,600
Saint Mary's because they can't
Sjsu obviously
Wazzu 3400
Wyoming 4200

Unlv, Vanderbilt, miami, and wake forest have all been under that in recent years.


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slcagg wrote: ↑

March 1st, 2024, 8:22 pm

LarryTheAggie wrote: ↑

March 1st, 2024, 7:53 pm

RogerAndersen wrote: ↑

March 1st, 2024, 5:28 pm

Would there be anything wrong with the MWC approaching every current and potential MWC school and informing them that the MWC has minimum standards/goals..

For the health and well-being of the league, if you want to be a member of this league in good standing, there are requirements.

You need a functional 20K seat Football Stadium and we need you to be averaging 15K actual butts in seats.

And you need to have a functional 10K arena for Basketball and you need to be averaging 5k actual butts in seats.

If your team is not there, let's look at your plan to get there via facilities improvements/expansion and let's review your progress toward those plans.

That is the kind of vision/leadership the conference needs.

You would immediately be kicking out both Oregon State and Washington State.

I know Washington st is pretty good this year but both those programs historically have been pretty poor in bball.

It doesn't matter if they are good. WAZZU will never average more than 5000 at a basketball game. Trust me, I have been to plenty of games IN THE Beasley Coliseum.

We just need to find a way to dump SJSU, Air Force and Hawaii.

New Mexico was on my list but they’re a great basketball school.

Wyoming is really close to getting on my dump list.

And before yall are coming at me with the “Utah State would be on everyone else’s cut list” we have actual on field/court success, in a bigger TV market. We bring value that those others done.

Maybe this would be a starting point for adding schools. But even CSU doesn't have a 10K seat basketball arena, are you really going to kick CSU out? Also, while you can mandate a capacity of an arena you can't mandate people attend. There have been years when USU football is bad that we wouldn't average 15K. So do you kick them out of the conference and then if they get attendance high enough invite them back? Bad idea.

Again, maybe in thinking about adding new schools you can use this as a sort of first cut and if they don't make it but have extraordinary results or bring something else to the table you can excuse it.

Makes no sense to kick anyone out, the minute either WSU or OSU (or both) can bail, and they will if given the chance, we'll be right back where we were. If we kick schools out, where do they go? CUSA? So we doom them for a few years to an inferior conference while we play nicey with the PAC2 until they get plucked, the come back and swoop into invite back those we bailed on to re-join us? Seems like a bad strategy.

Oregon State has won more ncaa tournament games than Utah State in the last 10 years. Just sayin. And they do have Gary Payton to brag about.

Going all in on being a Basketball Conference isn't my idea of a viable strategy for the conference, basketball just doesn't bring in the money that football does. The MWC is already a solid basketball league, as long as USU, SDSU, UNLV, Nevada, and New Mexico are in the league and are competitive it's not hard to see the league routinely getting 4 or more tournament bids.

IMHO The real challenge, and what any growth should focus on is improving MWC football and eating into the market share of the other Group of 5 conferences, and to do that I think you need to get into Texas, RICE and UTEP are two schools that you may be able to poach.

Full disclosure, I have no idea how many fans either of these schools get, how well run the athletic departments are and what the media share is for either of them, but having yearly visits to Texas helps with recruiting. others here may know many reasons why this is a stupid idea and I'm willing to concede that

UTEP?

AggieFBObsession wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 2:54 pm

UTEP?

Not for quality of program, but to get into Texas

But UTEP is in New Mexico....

SoJo_Aggie wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 2:57 pm

AggieFBObsession wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 2:54 pm

UTEP?

Not for quality of program, but to get into Texas

So then take UTSA and Rice or UNT.

SoJo_Aggie wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 2:57 pm

AggieFBObsession wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 2:54 pm

UTEP?

Not for quality of program, but to get into Texas

I want what you're smoking.

AggieFBObsession wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 5:41 pm

SoJo_Aggie wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 2:57 pm

AggieFBObsession wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 2:54 pm

UTEP?

Not for quality of program, but to get into Texas

I want what you're smoking.

No you don't, the stuff coming through the El paso boarder is low quality.

AggieFBObsession wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 5:41 pm

SoJo_Aggie wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 2:57 pm

AggieFBObsession wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 2:54 pm

UTEP?

Not for quality of program, but to get into Texas

I want what you're smoking.

In my defense, I fully prefaced everything by saying it could be a stupid idea for untold number of reasons, my main point was don't build the conference around basketball, but try to find a way to steal market share in football from the American and C-USA

USUaggie wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 3:55 pm

But UTEP is in New Mexico....

Not sure if joking so forgive me but UTEP is indeed in Texas. Close to New Mexico and definitely not in the heart of Texas where the recruiting hot beds are and where we want a footprint though.

Coloraggie wrote: ↑

March 5th, 2024, 1:52 pm

USUaggie wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 3:55 pm

But UTEP is in New Mexico....

Not sure if joking so forgive me but UTEP is indeed in Texas. Close to New Mexico and definitely not in the heart of Texas where the recruiting hot beds are and where we want a footprint though.

Thanks Sherlock Yeah, what you said.

SoJo_Aggie wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 2:34 pm

Going all in on being a Basketball Conference isn't my idea of a viable strategy for the conference, basketball just doesn't bring in the money that football does. The MWC is already a solid basketball league, as long as USU, SDSU, UNLV, Nevada, and New Mexico are in the league and are competitive it's not hard to see the league routinely getting 4 or more tournament bids.

IMHO The real challenge, and what any growth should focus on is improving MWC football and eating into the market share of the other Group of 5 conferences, and to do that I think you need to get into Texas, RICE and UTEP are two schools that you may be able to poach.

Full disclosure, I have no idea how many fans either of these schools get, how well run the athletic departments are and what the media share is for either of them, but having yearly visits to Texas helps with recruiting. others here may know many reasons why this is a stupid idea and I'm willing to concede that

UTEP is nominally in Texas, but barely. El Paso is in the Mountain time zone, is as close to San Diego as it is to Houston, and people in the Dallas/San Antonio/Houston triangle, where 95% of Texans hang their hats, couldn't give two damns about UTEP athletics. No market advantage, no recruiting advantage, just another mouth to feed. Pass.

Rice is an old, established, elite university in Houston, and cares little to nothing about athletics. My semi-educated guess is that the ratio of UT or A&M fans to Rice fans in that same triangle is about 500:1, but I'm a generous man. Pass.

UTSA or North Texas might be more like it, but even then I'm not convinced they'd add more value to the league than they'd cost.

OKAggie wrote: ↑

March 5th, 2024, 3:49 pm

SoJo_Aggie wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 2:34 pm

Going all in on being a Basketball Conference isn't my idea of a viable strategy for the conference, basketball just doesn't bring in the money that football does. The MWC is already a solid basketball league, as long as USU, SDSU, UNLV, Nevada, and New Mexico are in the league and are competitive it's not hard to see the league routinely getting 4 or more tournament bids.

IMHO The real challenge, and what any growth should focus on is improving MWC football and eating into the market share of the other Group of 5 conferences, and to do that I think you need to get into Texas, RICE and UTEP are two schools that you may be able to poach.

Full disclosure, I have no idea how many fans either of these schools get, how well run the athletic departments are and what the media share is for either of them, but having yearly visits to Texas helps with recruiting. others here may know many reasons why this is a stupid idea and I'm willing to concede that

UTEP is nominally in Texas, but barely. El Paso is in the Mountain time zone, is as close to San Diego as it is to Houston, and people in the Dallas/San Antonio/Houston triangle, where 95% of Texans hang their hats, couldn't give two damns about UTEP athletics. No market advantage, no recruiting advantage, just another mouth to feed. Pass.

Rice is an old, established, elite university in Houston, and cares little to nothing about athletics. My semi-educated guess is that the ratio of UT or A&M fans to Rice fans in that same triangle is about 500:1, but I'm a generous man. Pass.

UTSA or North Texas might be more like it, but even then I'm not convinced they'd add more value to the league than they'd cost.

UTEP has some history with some MWC schools, but beyond that they bring nothing to the table except another mouth to feed. The chance they add value down the road is also minimal.

UTSA and North Texas are similar in not really bringing current value. However, there is some potential for either of those two schools to add future value. For that reason alone, I would at least consider a look at them.

First and foremost, I would favor continuing an open dialogue with WSU and OSU regarding joining with us and making our way together in college athletics. Whether as the MWC or under some other moniker.

I think WSE and OSU are still living the dream of riding the coat tails of their former conference mates. That ship has already sailed and WSU and OSU were not on it. So any pressure and urgency is ultimately going to have to come from them.

They are the ones who will be seeing budgets shrivel. They are the ones whose endowments are going to be in severe decline/jeopardy.

The MWC can continue on being a 6 bid league without the Pacific NW twins far into the future, as far as I am concerned.

Population Growth and Incomes in the West (outside of California) continue to grow explosively.

I believe WSU and OSU would make sense in our league culturally, athletically, academically, and financially.

The MWC success in MBB will soon bleed over into FB, if it isn't already. So we will continue making our way quite well as the MWC. I believe the MBB success and track record is also going to pay dividends in FB in the near future.

Really quickly, the question is going to become, how long can WSU and OSU continue as the Pac 2?

SoJo_Aggie wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 2:57 pm

AggieFBObsession wrote: ↑

March 4th, 2024, 2:54 pm

UTEP?

Not for quality of program, but to get into Texas

UTEP gets us the Juarez Market, not really a foothold in Texas. I think UTEP was lucky to have been invited to the WAC. They would have been smart to stick it out instead of joining CUSA the minute they got the chance. They wanted to big-time NMSU so bad that they let that cloud their decision-making process, knowing that NMSU was likely getting into the WAC eventually. Had UTEP stayed in the WAC, they may have gotten ours or SJSU's spot in the MWC.

Q: What part of Texas is called out by "Mountain" or "West"?

A: It is not.

However, I would be interested in WSU/OSU as potential additions to the MWC because of A) the geographical location/fit and B) because of the fit of of their educational missions, and C) because their conference "partners" hung them out to dry and they need to find a like-minded group of institutions to align and organize with.

"Out in the West Texas town of El Paso,
I fell in love... ."

USU78 wrote: ↑

March 25th, 2024, 1:22 pm

"Out in the West Texas town of El Paso,
I fell in love... ."

Is Rosa's Cantina still there?