Mountain West turns tables with additions of Fresno State, UNR

By Ryan Greene

Thursday, Aug. 19, 2010 | 2:15 a.m.

When asked what his thoughts were on leaving the Western Athletic Conference with six members at the end of a hectic day, Mountain West Conference commissioner Craig Thompson managed to sound somewhat cryptic Wednesday night.

"I am an employee of the Mountain West Conference, and my job, my challenge, is to make this conference better every day," he said, plain and simple, during a teleconference without further elaboration.

And in one day, Thompson managed to bring his fledgling league back from what appeared to be a trip to potential extinction and up onto solid ground, as Nevada-Reno and Fresno State accepted invitations Wednesday afternoon the join the MWC as early as the fall of 2011.

In turn, the WAC, which this summer has lost three of its members to the MWC, could be down for the count.

The day began with swirling reports surrounding MWC member BYU, with a 'done deal' in place to become an independent in football and the WAC's ninth member in all other sports.

With that move, Boise State held most of the chips at the table, as it had the right to decide if it wanted to go back to the WAC without facing any type of penalty. The Broncos accepted an MWC invitation back on June 11, but if they had stayed in the WAC and BYU had left to join them, Thompson could have found his league on life support.

Now, it's going to be up to BYU to make the next move, as the prospects of becoming merely the seventh member of a severely weakened league don't look as attractive as they did just 24 hours earlier.

Thompson deflected questions Wednesday night regarding BYU's future with the league.

"BYU is a member of the Mountain West Conference," he said. "They participated in several conference calls with our board of directors in the past 48 hours, including today.

"I don't know BYU's intentions. They are a full member, a voting member, a participating member of the Mountain West Conference as we have this call tonight."

BYU has a couple of options now, and Thompson said there is no deadline in place for one of the league's charter members to make a decision.

The school could go for football independence and aligning its other programs with another conference, such as the West Coast Conference. Another route could be deciding to stick with the Mountain West, which might force Thompson's hand in making another bold move. He reiterated several times Wednesday night that the league's ultimate goal is to become a Bowl Championship Series automatic qualifier.

A 10-team league moving forward without BYU might not get the MWC there, but keeping BYU and adding a 12th school — for example, a program such as Houston — could help the conference over that hump and into the national spotlight, though the addition of Fresno State and UNR keeps the league's football profile strong and very respectable.

"There is no immediate push, rush, concern to get to 12 (members) and look at a (conference championship football) game," Thompson safely said. "It may happen, it may not happen.

"This is an ongoing process, that we talk about memberships and the configuration of the conference at just about every board meeting in some form or fashion. Some (board members) are still interested in 12 members, not all board members are at that position."

When reached by the Sun on Wednesday evening, UNLV athletic director Jim Livengood indicated his gut feeling was that the Mountain West would grow.

"I don't have a crystal ball and I know (UNLV president Neal Smatresk) and I have talked a lot about this," Livengood said. "I know there's a scenario where we're not done expanding. There's a lot of things that could happen with other schools, and etc. I wouldn't see us totally done at 10 teams."

Added Smatresk, in a phone interview with the Sun: "I think it's a little bit unclear of what the fate of every team in the league is going to be, and I'm not going to pre-judge it. What I will tell you is given all the shake-ups that have gone on around the country, I think any league not considering what the future might bring is not planning well."

Livengood also gave his opinion on BYU's quest for football independence, which could make the Cougars the biggest name among the Football Bowl Subdivision independents behind Notre Dame.

"I think that they're really in a precarious situation on a lot of fronts," he said. "I just don't understand somebody thinking they can go independent in this day and age. Notre Dame is Notre Dame, and even Notre Dame knows that it's not an easy road any more."

One area regarding BYU where Thompson sounded as if he would put his foot down — without specifically saying so — was the potential scenario of the Cougars going independent in football and trying to stay with the Mountain West elsewhere across the board.

He claimed that no special exceptions will be made for BYU, who will have to decide either to be a member or not, plain and simple.

"They know who we are," he said. "An institution is allowed to individually make any decision they want. That's geared towards them. There are leagues that have made, perhaps, concessions to certain members to retain them and keep them in the league. That's not what the Mountain West Conference has done."

While the future remains undetermined, there are some immediate logistics to be dealt with.

Thompson said that while Boise State is set to join the MWC in time for the 2011-12 athletic season, no timetable has been set for UNR and Fresno State. He added, though, that he'd prefer it to be 2011 rather than 2012.

There are also the two monetary story lines beneath all of this.

The first has to do with the Mountain West's current TV deal, which all but shuns ESPN. Instead, the league currently operates its own network — The Mtn. — and also has games broadcast on CBS-College Sports and Versus.

Thompson was in Philadelphia on Wednesday for a meeting with Comcast, which is a part-owner of The Mtn. network. Fresno is the No. 55 television market in the country and largely is covered by Comcast.

He had no details to unveil regarding potential alterations to the league's oft-criticized TV package.

It is widely believed that the potential to get more football TV revenue out of its own network — and possibly ESPN — is one driving force behind BYU's desire to break off on its own for college athletics' most lucrative sport.

The other dollar-driven talking point has to do with both exit fees from the WAC and entrance fees to the MWC for the three new members.

Thompson confirmed that the entrance fee originally given to Boise State in June will more than likely change in an effort to have all three incoming schools pay roughly the same amount.

As for exit fees from the WAC, that is more of a concern for UNR and Fresno State.

Both schools reportedly signed a five-year deal with the WAC a week ago that would enforce a $5 million buy-out fee should any of the members decide to leave in that timeframe.

However, a report by the Reno Gazette-Journal on Wednesday evening stated that UNR never signed the agreement.

Either way, Thompson made it sound as if the Mountain West will be assisting both schools with their exit fees in an effort to keep his product strong.

"Our intent is they come in as strong as they are today and not be jeopardized or behind in any way that would not allow them to compete at the highest level they can compete at," he said. "We're not going to bankrupt them to come into the Mountain West Conference."