The Mountain West, which recently added Boise St., Nevada, and Fresno St, appears close to a deal with Hawaii.  Hawaii's A.D. said they had a "handshake deal" by phone this week.

That would give the Mountain West 11 teams. Ideally , they'd like to have 12. Houston is the most commonly mentioned addition.

Hurting the most is the Western Athletic Conference. They're losing Boise, Nevada, Fresno and Hawaii and replacing them with Denver, Texas St., and Texas-San Antonio.  That's quite a drop off.  Returning members are Idaho, New Mexico St., San Jose, Utah St.,  and Louisiana Tech.

I never understood why Louisiana Tech was in the WAC, anyway. They're  better geographically suited for the Sun Belt.  But they were formerly a member of the  Sun Belt. There are some hard feelings that still persist about Tech’s departure and its subsequent efforts to undermine the Sun Belt since it left.

One such case occurred in 2001 when Louisiana Tech, after they left the Su Belt  essentially blocked an 8-3 Middle Tennessee  squad from securing an at-large bid to a bowl game. The Louisiana Tech administration refused to work with the Sun Belt that would have kept Louisiana Tech closer to home for its bowl game and likely sent Middle Tennessee to the Humanitarian Bowl in Boise. All of the parties of the deal had come to an agreement except Louisiana Tech who refused to oblige the deal. Instead, La. Tech went to the Humanitarian Bowl and Mid. Tennessee stayed home

Actually, fair number of rumors that TCU will not be in the MWC much longer.     

As a BYU fan, it;s been interesting to watch.  I feel for Boise State, who is going from the WAC, on ESPN to the MWC, buried in your sports tier of programs in on the mtn.,  playing in a glorified WAC conference if TCU leaves.     

al, as a Syracuse native and SU fan, we'll take the Frogs immediately.  The travel budget will in part be justified by additional exposure in Texas and increased recruiting opportunities for both football (program is improving) and basketball...plus, we don't play baseball here - how's their lacrosse team :)

If TCU stays in the Mountain West, there's a good chance they'll take away the Big East's 'BCS berth' and give it to the MVC. The ACC is also suspect but they have an advantage over the Big East....the ACC has a tie-in the Orange Bowl. The Big East lacks such a connection

Posted by alblack56 on 11/21/2010 1:41:00 PM (view original):
If TCU stays in the Mountain West, there's a good chance they'll take away the Big East's 'BCS berth' and give it to the MVC. The ACC is also suspect but they have an advantage over the Big East....the ACC has a tie-in the Orange Bowl. The Big East lacks such a connection

With all due respect to the Panthers of Northern Iowa, you mean the MWC, al.

But I can't see TCU moving to the Big East when that AQ status change is so possible.  The Big East doesn't deserve an AQ right now, and everyone knows it.

Posted by cornfused on 11/21/2010 1:58:00 PM (view original):

Posted by alblack56 on 11/21/2010 1:41:00 PM (view original):
If TCU stays in the Mountain West, there's a good chance they'll take away the Big East's 'BCS berth' and give it to the MVC. The ACC is also suspect but they have an advantage over the Big East....the ACC has a tie-in the Orange Bowl. The Big East lacks such a connection

With all due respect to the Panthers of Northern Iowa, you mean the MWC, al.

But I can't see TCU moving to the Big East when that AQ status change is so possible.  The Big East doesn't deserve an AQ right now, and everyone knows it.

MWC has been told that BCS qualification will not happen.

Posted by bscoresby on 11/21/2010 5:38:00 PM (view original):

Posted by cornfused on 11/21/2010 1:58:00 PM (view original):

Posted by alblack56 on 11/21/2010 1:41:00 PM (view original):
If TCU stays in the Mountain West, there's a good chance they'll take away the Big East's 'BCS berth' and give it to the MVC. The ACC is also suspect but they have an advantage over the Big East....the ACC has a tie-in the Orange Bowl. The Big East lacks such a connection

With all due respect to the Panthers of Northern Iowa, you mean the MWC, al.

But I can't see TCU moving to the Big East when that AQ status change is so possible.  The Big East doesn't deserve an AQ right now, and everyone knows it.

MWC has been told that BCS qualification will not happen.

Anything can happen in 4 years. The earliest the change could happen is 2014

According to ESPN's Graham Watson, "under current BCS rules the Big East could keep its automatic bid and the Mountain West could earn one for the 2012 season."

Didn't Graham Watson leave ESPN?

The "could" of her statement is that of the 3 criteria, the MWC(as constitued with BYU, BSU, and TCU) scored in the top 3 of conferences in 2 categories and the last they scored as the 7th best conference.  For automatic qualification, you have to be lower than 6 in all 3 criteria. You can petition the BCS if you are ok in 2 criteria, but 7th or 8th in another criteria. That is how they "could"


The criteria that they are seventh in is average team rank per conference. I don't know what the numbers look like with BYU out, and Nevada, Fresno State, and Hawaii in.  The fact is, Wyoming, UNM, UNLV and CSU have not been good recently.

If the conference would be BYU, Utah, TCU, BSU, and they purged one of the bottom dwellers from football in the conference (see New Mexico) when they took BSU on, the MWC would be in the top 6 of all conferences and be guaranteed an auto-bid. 

How do the Big East and ACC rank in those same categories? Are they in the top 6 in each?

yes...

the criteria:

"*The evaluation includes the following for each conference (1) the ranking of the highest-ranked team in the final BCS Standings each year (if a conference does not place a team in the final BCS Standings, then its highest-ranked team is determined by the conference member that has the highest average ranking in the computer rankings used in the BCS Standings), (2) the final regular-season rankings of all conference teams in the computer rankings used by the BCS each year, and (3) the number of teams in the top 25 of the final BCS Standings each year, with adjustments to account for differences in the number of members of each conference."

How it affects the mtn west: the one they don't qualify under is the final ranking of ALL teams.  Under the current system  both the big east and the ACC had better bottom of the conference teams, and poorer top of the conference teams.  results in scoring worse at top of the conference and better at the bottom.

New Mexico, UNLV, CSU and Wyoming have all be dreadful during the 08/09/10/11 eval period.  They really drag that number down. 

The only good thing about expansion, as seen by the BCS is that Utah now plays in the PAC10, and BSU and TCU must play each other every year.

http://www.bcsfootball.org/news/story?id=5126859

To follow up- the MWC is not happy with Hawaii announcing that a "handshake" deal is in place; most people in Colorado Springs (home of the MWC) believe that TCU is gone for good.

For TV rights, reimburstment will fall 50% for teams under the .mtn/comcast dea.  It will become a more regional, but remaining schools believe this might be a better thing, as the 3 teams that wanted national coverage (BYU, TCU, Utah) are not going to be around any more, meaning they have to cater less to any one school.

http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/college/2010/11/29/2010-11-29_texas_christian_universitys_horned_frogs_invited_into_the_big_east_source.html

So... the MWC is now the glorified WAC