Mountaintop View 8-7-23. Aggies ready, Aztec’s scrimmage, MW/PAC Merger? Conference Realignment, Mackey Award

It’s Monday, and we are back at it. Fall camp is in full swing and we are getting daily football updates on your favorite teams! Through it all, the content keeps going. Check out our original coverage and what we can find from the world wide web below.

Aggies hungry and healthy to open camp.

As Utah State opens up fall camp, they will prepare with 39 new scholarship players, most of which are JUCO or transfer players. They may have a lot of depth this season, but that depth will be put to the test with player 7 teams that won 7 games last year. On the other hand, the team is short on experience, and they have to clean up the turnover issues that plagued them last season. Coach Anderson also wants the Aggies to spread the ball around more on offense and get more players involved.

Defense leads the way for Aztecs in their first scrimmage.

Stop me if you’ve heard this before: San Diego State’s defense is looking good, but the offense is still a work in progress. Young safeties Josh Hunter, Eric Butler, Max Garrison, and Marcus Ratcliffe, the latter being a true freshman, all had big moments in one way or another during the scrimmage. The future looks bright in the secondary. In a somewhat confusing move, all six quarterbacks got time, with Jalen Mayden seeing some action but not enough to get in a rhythm. He led some nice drives but either stalled or settled for field goals. He looked good on the run, but seemed out of sorts in the pocket. Although some positives might be that SDSU has the deepest group of tight ends in the conference.

Mountain West/PAC merger on the horizon?

The big realignment question moving forward is what happens to the remaining four PAC teams? And Mountain West fans are wondering how it will impact their teams. One option could be to merge the two conferences. However, would all 12 MW teams be involved in the merger? Depending on how many teams the conference leadership wants to have and how many PAC teams want to merge with Mountain West teams, it could result in some teams being left out. That would not be ideal, but neither would passing up an opportunity to add some new teams to the top half of the conference.

Conference Realignment guts the PAC. How will it impact the MW?

Mackey Award

On the horizon:

• Later today: A new MWC Recruiting Roundup with the latest news, offers, and commitments. Plus, August Team Recruiting Rankings
• Later today: 2023 San Diego State Team Preview
• Coming Tuesday: The Good, The Bad, The Ugly: Season Predictions Part 2
• Coming Tuesday: 2023 San Jose State Team Preview
• Coming Tuesday: Hike’s Peak Podcast Episode 8: Best Offenses
• Coming Tuesday: Reacts Survey: Conference Realignment and Mountain West Offenses
• Coming Wednesday: Peak Perspective: Rankings the 2023 Mountain West Offenses
• Coming Wednesday: 2023 Utah State Team Preview