WAC to drop football after 2012 season

By Kevin Kelley -

The WAC will drop football after the 2012 season, commissioner Jeff Hurd told The Denver Post this morning.

It’s possible that the conference could fold altogether if they are unable to add enough schools. In order to keep NCAA Division I status, the WAC must have seven members.

“I think that sometime in late July it became apparent that it was unlikely we could continue with football,” Hurd said. “We looked at every option we could think of. With the geography we have in terms of schools, it presents a challenge.”

Trouble began brewing for the conference after Boise State departed for the MWC in 2011, which was later followed by Fresno State, Hawaii, and Nevada announcing the same move for 2012.

The WAC scrambled to add Texas State and UTSA, but conference realignment hit the them hard again when four schools accepted offers from other conferences for the 2013 season. Texas State is heading to the Sun Belt, Louisiana Tech and UTSA are moving to C-USA, and San Jose State and Utah State are off to the MWC.

That left Idaho and New Mexico State as the only remaining football-playing members of the WAC. Idaho will likely opt to be an FBS Independent for a couple of years while New Mexico State’s future remains uncertain.

The WAC formed in 1962 with six members: Arizona, Arizona State, BYU, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming. Arizona and Arizona State left for the Pac-10 in 1978 while the remaining four members chartered the Mountain West in 1999.

On Saturday, Dec. 1, New Mexico State will travel to Texas State on Dec. 1 to play the final WAC football game.

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Comments (24)

I hate this. Sad to see the WAC end as they have given us great memories throughout the years. Good luck to Idaho & New Mexico State.

I enjoyed watching WAC football, wait so where would all of the WAC schools move to? or will all those schools drop there football programs?

agreed footabll fan

when i watch a sun belt game or a mac game go to 45-46 or higher i think, ah good old WAC style football, He who has last possesion wins.

sad day in sports to see the wac go.

As the article points out USU is going to the MWC and LATech to CUSA. The WAC will continue to exist without football.

The move to 16 schools in a conference that was just too spread out was the beginning of its end.

We are now down to 10 FBS conferences. If the expected trajectory of 4 superconferences takes form, 6 more conferences need to be eliminated.

the superconfrences are gonna be the SEC, BIG 12, PAC 12, AND BIG 10, the BIG EAST and ACC will probably stay too, notre dame will join the BIG EAST or BIG 10, BYU will go to PAC 12, idaho and nmsu will probably join FCS/1AA division confrences. army, navy, and air force will make their own sports confrence called the MC (military conference), C-USA will merge with the MWC, SUNBELT, and MAC and create the biggest football conference in NCAA history, but will still be called C-USA. the SEC will be the overpowered confrence as they will probably add 4 more teams (UNC,OKLAHOMA,GA TECH,TEXAS)and memphis(only for basketball)the big 12 will get back nebraska, and the big 10 will kepp their teams AND add maryland and rutgers. this will all happen by 2035

Big East still needs a 14th member, and Air Force is the most likely. If that happens, NMSU might take their place.

Yeah,

but in some years the SEC will have two teams that broken away. the ideal size of a football conference is tweleve teams with two divisions and a 5(divisional games)-1 permanent rival-2 intradivisional games) and 4 nonconference games.

Hard to justify all the mega conference mergers and moves and teams like Boise and SDSU going to the Big East. The dollars have spoken. While this is the current trend, one would have to imagine the that the MWC could have secured ‘preferred conference’ status had they not lost BYU, Boise, and SDSU. Perhaps the Big East will transform and create a western conference with BYU, Fresno, UNLV or another.