Boise State To The Mountain West May Finally Become A Reality

by Jeremy Mauss on May 12, 2010 10:04 PM PDT in Conference Expansion

Out of all of the expansion rumors regarding the Big 10 have been exactly that, just rumors. However, Boise State to the Mountain West has been an obvious slap in the face move to join the Mountain West, but a lot of people (pointing at myself here) have been wondering why the league has not made any noise about this.

Expansion talk regarding the Mountain West goes back to the fall of 2007, with frequently updated posts wondering why Boise has not been invited yet, and then there was that secret invite for Boise to join the Mountain West which was floated around nearly 18 months ago. The Broncos are an obvious fit with their multiple regular season undefeated seasons and two BCS wins.

The BCS finally released their super secret formula and the Mountain West, as expected, is being dragged down by San Diego State, UNLV, and New Mexico. Those bottoms teams are the reason the Mountain West is currently not entirely on track to become a BCS league, but they are close. The addition of Boise would make them stronger in the average computer rankings for the conference, which is where the league is not in the top six and behind the Big 10.

Perhaps Craig Thompson, the Mountain West Athletic Directors, and school Presidents have been doing this the right way, by being quiet about expansion. The presidents do meet in June and while there are no sources saying expansion will happen it most certainly will be on the table:

The Mountain West Conference presidents meet next month, and there's at least a decent chance that they will formally invite BSU - if not immediately after the gathering, then before July 1.
[...]
If the MWC wants Boise State's performance in the 2008-10 seasons to be included in the formula that determines whether the MWC receives an automatic BCS bid for the next cycle of games - and it sure as heck does - then the Broncos must be a member of the MWC in 2011.

And for them to be a member in 2011, they must be invited by July 1, 2010.

Even though adding Boise may not put the Mountain West over the top to become a BCS league -- because of the bottom of the league is weighing them down -- this move could be seen as a move to make the league stronger then the Big East ~~once~~ when they get taken over by the Big 10. Plus, this could be a way to keep Utah from going to the Pac-10 by creating a stronger Mountain West, but we all know Utah would jump at the chance to join them for the financial security and the prestige that the Pac-10 would bring long term.

Kudos all-around to Craig Thompson once the invite is made official which must be made by June 30th, so that the 2008-2010 Boise State's rankings from the WAC will be counted toward the Mountain West's BCS rankings. Is it too early to welcome the Broncos to the Mountain West for 2011 football?

Poll

Will Boise State be invited to the MWC by the June 30th deadline?

Yes

339 votes

No

122 votes

The invite should have came the day after they beat TCU in the Fiesta Bowl

224 votes

685 votes | Poll has closed

Tweet Comment 18 comments | Add comment | 0 recs |

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Comments

I want this to happen but....

hasn’t the MWC commish been publicly adamant that the league feels like they don’t need Boise State?

The thought of playing BYU, Utah, and TCU every year is very exciting to me. However, I’m incredibly skeptical at the same time.

"Hell, I can get you a toe by 3 o'clock this afternoon... with nail polish."

by JRig on May 12, 2010 10:31 PM PDT reply actions

kinda

Thompson has always said there is no need to expand unless it assures the MWC will get an auto bid. However he has spftened that stance over the past year.

Mountain West Connection

by Jeremy Mauss on May 13, 2010 5:00 AM PDT up reply actions

*softened

Mountain West Connection

by Jeremy Mauss on May 13, 2010 5:00 AM PDT up reply actions

if thompson screws this up i want this guy fired. be proactive. beat the others to the punch

mr. thompson this is an obvious good move and great for our conference.

I'm all about covering the spread and moneylines. I was building a house, I don't deserve this, deserves have nothing to do with it. Bang. "Unforgiven" I drink your milkshake. I drink it up! "There Will BE Blood". Hell is just a word, the reality is much much worse." Event Horizon". Now remember, when things look bad and it looks like you're not gonna make it, then you gotta get mean, I mean plumb, mad dog mean. cause if you lose your head and you give up then you neither live or win. That's just the way it is. "The Outlaw Josey Wales". "And that's just what these hustlers look for. They cruise from casino to casino looking for weak dealers the way lions look for weak antelope". Ace Rothstein, The Movie "Casino" 1995.

by wolfmanshowlforever on May 13, 2010 11:30 AM PDT up reply actions 1 recs

I agree

Thompson needs to realize that we are NOT a BCS Conference… If he wants to get in that elite group he needs to bemuch more proactive.

UNLV is going all the way this year!

by rebelfan1 on May 13, 2010 3:08 PM PDT up reply actions

I have little doubt that the MWC will invite Boise State

The bigger question is, will Boise State accept? Utah will likely be gone to the Pac-10 and there is also a chance TCU and BYU may end up in the Big 12 if it is raided.

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by Michael Rueckert on May 12, 2010 11:29 PM PDT reply actions

dan beebe (the big 12 commish) is being proactive. he has contacted larry scott(pac-ten commish)

about a joint venture college football tv channel. i think that leaves utah out. it’s like thompson is waiting for something to happen and by then it will be to late.

by wolfmanshowlforever on May 13, 2010 11:32 AM PDT up reply actions

possibly

The Pac-10 doesnt need to expand unless they REALLY want a title game, and only Utah and CU are the best fit. If their is a joint TV channel or contract no need for Utah. Only way would be if the Big XII loses teams and they go after utah and BYU to replace some northern teams.

Mountain West Connection

by Jeremy Mauss on May 13, 2010 2:38 PM PDT up reply actions

Utah has shown to probably not be gone by the BCS Deadline although they might be gone after that

Larry Scott himself said that before the end of the year they will have made a decision about expansion, not before July 1. With the Pac-10 looking to get money through combining TV Deals with the Big 12.

UNLV is going all the way this year!

by rebelfan1 on May 13, 2010 3:10 PM PDT up reply actions

I just don't see it anymore.

I can see the invite being sent. It’s like the golden ticket Boise’s AD and President have been waiting for. But to wait this long only because the automatic qualification criteria has been released… It’s as if the MWC will finally “settle” for Boise State because I guess it may help us.

I was sitting on the fence on this topic for a long time, partly leaning toward being added to the MWC because the WAC competition (including the top 2-4) is so sucky. But at this point, I feel it’s a little to late. Who wants to play for a league that may potentially lose 2-3 of those top 3 teams. Then they’ll be playing in a watered down (football) league again, with very little national exposure (yes, I went there). Plus, they would have paid millions to break their WAC contract — millions that a BCS conference invitation would have equalized, but not not from the Mountain.

Sorry, Craig. Sorry presidents. We’ve been asking for so long, it hardly seems like something we’d want anymore.

"Everyone counted us out. I don't know why they keep doing that." -- Kyle Wilson

by Loque on May 13, 2010 5:53 AM PDT reply actions

good points

Boise is at a point where they dont need the MWC to make the BCS or get near the top of the BCS. However, expansion from the Big 10 or the Pac-10 may not happen by June 30th which is the deadline for teams to join their league in time to include their BCS stats from 2007-2011. Meaning if Boise gets an invite they will receive the BCS benefits mainly the money, and that will happen even if Utah, BYU, or TCU goes to another league from 2012 and 2013 season.

Boise may be in a similar situation if all three leave but it would be the same situation as before in a slightly better league, plus I dont think TCU leaves because the Big XII does not need the Dallas area.

Mountain West Connection

by Jeremy Mauss on May 13, 2010 8:13 AM PDT up reply actions

Truthfully,

I don’t think the Pac-10 has a real reason to expand other than a championship game to get more money. If the Pac-10 combines TV deals with the Big 12, the Pac-10 expansion rumors should end. Plus, the Pac-10 doesn’t have much options, plus with the unanimous vote rule, it won’t be easy to get 2 other schools into the Pac-10.

The only conference that I really think needs/wants to expand is the Big 10. They can’t make their TV Deal much better, and the only way to make more cash is to add a championship game. Plus the Big 10 has much more options, so if one school says no, its not like their out of options like the Pac-10 would be.

For the Pac-10, a championship game does bring in a lot of revenue, but the combined TV Deal brings in way more. Not to mention Stanford has never really liked the idea of expansion and because their not gripping for cash, they really don’t need to. With that being the case, I think the Pac-10 will explore their options with trying to combine TV Deals before having to expand if that doesn’t work out.

In this scenario, if the Pac-10 combines TV Deals, the only way we lose schools is if the Big 10 takes one Big 12 North school.

Bottom Line: Pac-10 doesn’t really want to expand and if they combine TV Deals with the Big 12, they won’t expand. Big 10 is really the only other conference that needs to expand. The ways that we could lose school(s) is if the Big 10 takes a Big 12 North team or the Pac-10 doesn’t combine TV Deals.

UNLV is going all the way this year!

by rebelfan1 on May 13, 2010 3:22 PM PDT up reply actions 1 recs

what is weird about the big 10 dilemna is that they have to go to 16 teams if they want notre dame.

n.d. has already come out and said we are better off on our own b/c we are a “brand” and we have our own tv package. so if the big ten wants n.d. really bad they have to invite 4 other schools to make 16 teams. then all the dominoe’s fall.

by wolfmanshowlforever on May 13, 2010 3:46 PM PDT up reply actions

The key in the Big 12/Pac 10 channel is that if the Pac 10 decides to relieve the Big 12 of Colorado, Big 12 opinions may sour at the thought of sharing a channel with the Pac. Here’s hoping that Boise State not only gets invited, but that they get locked into an end of year rival role with TCU. See you at Amon Carter, Broncs.

by HawkeyedFrog on May 13, 2010 6:50 PM PDT reply actions

We would love to make that an annual tradition Hawkeyed...

Your purple accents on your uniforms and blood red streams on your helmets would look good on the Blue.

Contrary to popular belief on message boards, nobody around here wants to play NMSU and SJSU. We try to get excited about Nevada and Crazy Legs Kaepernick, and the great moustache following Vandals, but really, it is just too hard to get too excited about it. We have to manufacture slights and hope they call us Donkeys or something just to get fired up. (They usually oblige, but the threshold is getting higher and higher).

We appreciate the poll results. If 1 of the big 3 is gone, it still makes sense for us to come. If 2 of the 3 or all 3 of the “Big 3” are gone, with that crappy TV contract, we might as well stay in the WAC and try to poach the best of what’s left from the former MWC, keep our ESPN love and get a 12 team conference with a conference championship game. It probably sucks to be Wyoming and CSU in that event.

I hope we know something soon.

by rjohnson_jl on May 14, 2010 11:01 AM PDT up reply actions

We’ve ended the football season playing you guys the last two years and once before that, so it makes a lot more sense than having Wyoming or anybody else be our last game.

Even if TCU gets the offer to move up to the Big 12 I would prefer staying in a Mega-Mountain West with Houston and (if they can sustain improvement) SMU making 12 teams. That’s a league with some balance that TCU could still likely win every two-three years, as opposed to being in a conference with 0U and company. I remember the days back when we played Texas every year and those days are not pretty.

by HawkeyedFrog on May 15, 2010 8:45 AM PDT up reply actions

To be fair to the MWC commissioner,

This entire deal is a bit of a tightrope walk. On the one hand, the MWC would obviously love to have Boise State. On the other hand, they can’t make it seem like they’re desperate to have Boise. If the MWC goes full monty on this and comes off like they’re begging Boise, then they almost shoot themselves in the foot: why would Boise want to change conferences to one that grovels like that? By analogy: why would the hot girl want to date a guy who seems desperate? It’s that whole ‘marrying upward’ thing.

I also think it was wise for the MWC to take their time on this. They’ve had a chance to see how the other conference expansion rumors are playing out and how the BCS may appear to evolve over time. It’s been a very informative offseason, and this decision can only benefit from knowing that information.

And lastly: the MWC has to consider that Boise is not guaranteed to maintain this level of success. Even the major programs have their down years, and you have to understand what that looks like. What if Boise football does indeed go down the toilet?

All that said, I really hope this happens. The non-Boise MWC teams do offer more than the non-Boise WAC teams. TCU, BYU, and Utah are far more likely to get national viewership than pretty much any (non-Boise) WAC school, and having all four together would almost ensure a top 10 finish by at least one conference team each year.

by David Hooper on May 14, 2010 10:38 AM PDT reply actions

Boise weak

Boise is weak and VT will show the country how weak they’re. Year in and year out Boise plays Johnny Junior High and wins so what. They have beaten one good team ever. Big deal!! What happened at GA? Yeah we don’t talk about that in Boise country, we talk about beating Idaho State.

by riodog on Jun 13, 2010 12:03 AM PDT reply actions