Sunday, December 9, 2012

Reviving the Old 16-Team WAC in the Mountain West Conference

Some off us remember the old 16-member WAC.  It was with us just 3 short seasons from 1996 to 1998 and was the first attempt at a mega conference.   Teams were divided into 4 4-team scheduling pods that looked like this:

Pod 1: Hawaii, San Diego St, Fresno St, San Jose St

Pod 2: UNLV, Air Force, Colorado St, Wyoming

Pod 3: BYU, Utah, New Mexico, UTEP

Pod 4: Tulsa, Texas Christian, Southern Methodist, Rice

The 16 member WAC was the product of the collapse of two conferences, the Big West's football conference and the Southwest Conference, and the WAC taking pity on those homeless programs and taking them in. It unfortunately was aborted pre-maturely by a consortium of old guard schools known as "the Gang of Five", who were unhappy that they did not get to play each other as they did prior to expansion, at a secret meeting at the Denver Airport laid plans to create a new conference, the Mountain West. Of course, after that fateful airport meeting 8 members departed and a ninth, TCU, followed in 2001.  Gradually, more WAC schools drifted into the MWC including schools like Boise St, Nevada, and Utah St who were not part of the original 16-team WAC but joined the conference in the years following 1999 to replace the departed schools. The MWC has gone to the WAC to grab replacement schools because Utah departed for the Pac 12, TCU for the Big 12, a disgruntled BYU declared independence, and Boise St and San Diego St became embroiled in a desperate attempt by the Big East to stay relevant by adding football only members in the western United States.

Internet rumor de jour is that the MWC has not only been trying to lure San Diego St and Boise St back into the fold but SMU and Houston as well.  The Big East, which those four schools are slated to join in 2013, received a crushing blow during the Thanksgiving Raids, losing its two best remaining programs, Louisville and Rutgers to the ACC and Big Ten respectively.  The Big East is terribly unstable and its list of cast members in 2014 is hardly an all-star cast; it can't even be called a Conference USA all star cast because it included C-USA cellar dwellers Memphis and Tulane.  Since I brought up Tulane I should probably mention that the Big East's solution to losing Rutgers and Louisville was to invite Tulane as an all sports member and East Carolina as a football only member.  East Carolina also received a halfhearted promise from the Big East that they would consider bumping them up to full member status once this round of realignment finished shaking out and the Big East figured out who their 14th football school was going to be and whether or not school #14 was going to require full membership; if they did, the ECU presumably would as well.

If the MWC was able to bring/keep those 4 programs into the fold it would give the conference 14 members for football.  14 member conferences are all the rage and very en vogue right now but going to 16 has some advantages besides mere nostalgia.  The ability to pick out two schools in proximity to them to come along to the MWC is one of the "carrots" the MWC has extended SMU and Houston.  This would be a win-win for both sides as SMU and Houston would get travel partners but the MWC would get an even stronger presence in the football-loving and very populous state of Texas.  The leading candidates to be SMU and Houston's "prom dates" are UTEP, Tulsa, and UTSA.

UTEP has some history with the current MWC schools. UTEP was an old guard member of the WAC; they were there from 1967-2005 and left the WAC with a block of former SWC members (including SMU) to join an expanded and football-centric C-USA (which included another SWC refugee, Houston).  The Miners have a solid following; they attracted an average of just over 29,000 fans a game this past season.  The downside to the Miners is that they bring the smallest market of the candidates I mentioned (98th largest nationally) and they have not had much success on the gridiron in recent years.  There also might be some bad blood between UTEP and some current MWC schools in that UTEP abandoned some of them when they left the WAC.  It is also likely that there are some hard feelings on the part of the MWC schools because they have repeatedly sought out UTEP for membership (like back when they added San Jose St and Utah St) and UTEP rebuffed their advances.  Another thing to consider is that UTEP left to go be in C-USA to be with East Texas schools because UTEP wanted to be associated with the East Texas schools, not because the East Texas schools had any particular fondness for trips out to El Paso.

Tulsa is a small private school but they have been the most successful of the programs I'm considering for  MWC membership winning C-USA West 4 times and going on to win the C-USA title game twice.  They would bring both a new market (61st nationally) and a new state into the WMC.  They were also part of the 16-team MWC and have spent the past 8 years with Houston and SMU in C-USA.  Their average attendance is quite a bit smaller than UTEP's--they only averaged a home game attendance average of 20,418 this past season.  This is purely speculative but I believe than Houston and SMU also have considerable respect for Tulsa, SMU in particular because both schools are private, religious schools.

UTSA is the third school I'm going to throw into the mix.  The program is a young start up.  They bring no pedigree, history, or ties with any MWC schools but what they do bring is loads of potential and television sets.  They are in the largest market of these three leading candidates as San Antonio is the 37th largest in the US.  It is also a large market free of competition from a local NFL team in a state that loves football.  UTSA's attendance this year was comparable to UTEP's so folks in San Antonio are clearly showing some interest in the new program.  I think the UTSA program has enormous growth potential and that is why I think the MWC would be foolish to overlook the Roadrunnners.

I imagine that there are a few other candidates out there as well. Brigham Young is the obvious one but I am not entirely convinced that BYU can be lured back into the fold without giving them some considerable concessions regarding revenue sharing and tier 3 media rights.  It's also up in the air whether or not BYU would want to be in a "Forgotten 5" league.  Independence seems to be treating them alright and they get a nice television contract with ESPN but they do lack access to the playoff and playoff money which would be one perk of MWC membership.  Tulane is another school that could be in the mix.  SMU and Houston liked the Green Wave enough to allow them to become part of the Big East and while they have been atrocious on the gridiron lately the program is making strides and demonstrating a commitment to football by building an on campus stadium.  New Orleans is also a pretty big television market, albeit they have to compete with the Saints and Hornets for fans.  New Mexico St could be thrown on the list too but they offer very little to the MWC compared to the other schools I mentioned.  The same with Rice--while they were in the old WAC U of H already would give the MWC a Houston presence.

The new 16 member MWC should definitely go back to the Pod system of the old WAC.  Many of the schools involved were part of the old 16 member WAC and would be in the same pods with the same pod-mates as they were over 2 decades ago (I've bolded members of the 16 member WAC):

Pod 1: Hawaii, San Jose St, Fresno St, San Diego St

Pod 2: Nevada, UNLV, Boise St, Utah St

Pod 3: Wyoming, Colorado St, Air Force, New Mexico

Pod 4: Southern Methodist, Houston, 2 of Tulsa/UTEP/UTSA

As far as basketball goes I think the MWC will be alright with 15 members and giving Hawaii full membership won't be necessary.  For basketball and other sports the MWC could go to a 3-pod system for scheduling where each school would play each of their 4 pod-mates twice and the other 10 members once for a total of 18 games:

Pod A: San Jose St, Fresno St, San Diego St, Nevada, UNLV

Pod B: Boise St, Utah St, Wyoming, Colorado St, Air Force

Pod C: New Mexico, Southern Methodist, Houston, 2 of: Tulsa/UTEP/UTSA

I am going to give my endorsement for MWC membership to Tulsa and UTSA.  Tulsa brings a strong program and UTSA brings a television market and loads of potential.  Tulsa and San Antonio are both far larger than El Paso and if its one thing we have all learned from conference realignment these past few years it is all about television markets.  This is very unfortunate for UTEP, as they would be left out of the loop and stuck in a watered down C-USA that no longer had the same strong East Texas presence but UTEP has had multiple chances to get into the MWC and now they could very well find themselves without a spot.

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