Report: San Diego State to remain in Mountain West

By Kevin Kelley -
San Diego State
SDSU will reportedly remain in the MWC. Jake Roth-USA TODAY SPORTS

San Diego State will remain in the Mountain West Conference rather than join the Big East, ESPN has reported.

The Aztecs could be reinstated as early as today after the presidents of the MWC cast a vote. There needs to be a 75% majority in favor in order for SDSU to remain in the conference.

If the Aztecs do spurn the Big East, they will be the third team to leave the conference before actually playing a game. TCU and Boise State both joined the Big East, but the Horned Frogs later accepted an invite to the Big 12 while the Broncos remained in the MWC.

With San Diego State and Boise State remaining in the MWC, the conference will have 12 teams for the 2013 season: Air Force, Boise State, Colorado State, Fresno State, Hawaii, Nevada, New Mexico, San Diego State, San Jose State, UNLV, Utah State, and Wyoming.

12 teams also means that the MWC can split into two divisions and stage a championship game, which would likely be held at a campus site.

“I think that’s the plan,” said MWC commissioner Craig Thompson.

What would the two divisions look like? Brian Murphy of the Idaho Statesman says that one plan could be a simple East-West alignment (Mountain time zone/Pacific time zone):

East (Mountain): Air Force, Boise State, Colorado State, New Mexico, Utah State, Wyoming

West (Pacific): Fresno State, Hawaii, Nevada, San Jose State, San Diego State, UNLV

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Comments (14)

Awesome news for SDSU and West Coast football in general.

Terrible news for Cinci, UConn, USF and the rest of the CUSA refugees.

If UConn and Cincy join the Catholic 7 for Olympic sports we still might get the “Big Country” Conference for football. The Mountain West could consider the Huskies and Bearcats for football only. If that happens the conference would go from Storrs to Honolulu.

Not really terrible for CUSA 2.0. The coast-to-coast conference was a bad idea to begin with.

Looks like USD will stay the only school in SD to do the coast-to-coast thing where they’re also the only western school (the closest in the PFL is I think Drake).

Why the heck isn’t USD in the Big Sky with the other California FCS schools? I have wondered that for a while.

This is highly expected, but it’s a blow to the Big West. Sure, they still have Hawaii, but they’ve lost Boise State, San Diego State, and Pacific now in basketball since Pacific is headed to the West Coast Conference.

The other option that could work is “old” and “new”

West (WAC): Hawaii, Nevada, San Jose St, Fresno St, , Boise St, Utah St

Moutain(MWC): San Diego St, UNLV, New Mexico, Air Force, Wyoming, Colorado St

Logical cross rival: SDSU-Hawaii, UNLV-Nevada, Boise St-Wyoming, Utah St-Colorado St, Fresno St or San Jose St – Air Force or New Mexico

Advantages:
– preserves rivalries and associations of MWC and WAC
– minimize Hawaii travel issue (only one trip to Hawaii every 5 years for Mountain schools, and vice versa, except San Diego State)
– all schools get California access
Disadvantages:
– not as simple as time zone split
– CSU schools not in same division, SDSU host/hosted by them only every 5th year

Interesting Stuart, I suggested that very same alignment on ESPN.com and got relentlessly trashed………..

Living in calif, I can tell you that the CSU issue is not that big a deal. SDSU seldom played San Jose, and there was no rivalry with Fresno before Fresno joined the MWC.

In fact, I think the schools would prefer to be split. One more point. While there are certainly some good players in Northern California, it is nowhere near the recruiting hotbed Southern California is.

Big question now is, where does the Big East go? I’ve heard Tulsa, I’ve heard UMass, Southern Miss is a remote possibility.

I still have hope for cincy joining the big 12 would be a great add new tv market great basketball and great football

They won’t take Cincinnati. The Big 12 is setup to raid the elite football programs out of the ACC when that situation blows up. The Rose Bowl and Sugar bowl setup (Pac-12 vs B1G and SEC vs Big 12) is just the foreshadowing of the eventual superconference setup. Big 12 is just trying to wait long enough to have a spot open for Notre Dame when they finally decide to sit at the table before they are left out. The Big 12 will add Florida St and Clemson in the next couple of years to get back to 12. The B1G and SEC will also add from the ACC to get to 16, with SEC taking Virginia Tech and North Carolina and the B1G taking Georgia Tech. The question comes in here as whether they can convince Notre Dame then to join or if they will continue to hold out. If so, they will take Virginia to get to 16. The ACC will raid the Big East, Big East will raid C-USA, C-USA will raid the Sunbelt, etc. With two at 16, the Pac-12 will be forced to take Boise St and Nevada to at least expand to 14. I could even see them expanding outward and adding Houston and Tulsa to expand their footprint to get to 16. With Notre Dame still out there, the Big 12 will make a huge push for them and add Louisville to get to 14. If Notre Dame is still holding out, they will take Miami. Then the Big 12 will take BYU when Notre Dame finally falls in and joins to get them to 16. If they ever join at all and do not get some kind of exemption into the playoffs.