One other point. I don’t get the interest in GCU. New Mexico State dominated them in hoops until they moved to CUSA from the WAC with a 14-5 conference record. In the series NMSU was 9-0 at home and 6-5 at GCU. I would take NMSU any day over GCU.
There was a master plan in place. The plan by the PAC2 was to raid and blow up the MWC, instead of a reverse merger. They failed! The MWC is still intact. Also, the PAC was clearly outmaneuvered and who else is available? Sac State or Tx State?
I think the initial 10-15 million media package deal the PAC floated was tiered.
15 million - Original 6 plus Memphis/Tulane/USF/UTSA
That was dream scenario.
There were likely a few others until they got to doomsday scenario which was UNLV and USU.
that was the 10 million.
When UNLV said no, everything got derailed.
If they knew they had 10 million or more in a media deal regardless of who the 8th/9th/10th teams were they could have easily added UTEP or NMSU or Texas State and been done with it.
But they are probably staring at a media deal around 8 million with current configuration which would only be a slight bump from what Boise State is getting now and significantly less than WSU and OSU were getting in old PAC deal.
They had plans in place but definitely never thought it would get to this point.
Adding Gonzaga as full member means one more mouth to feed.
So even if they get Memphis and the package was 100 million you are splitting it 9 ways instead of 8.
As for adding NMSU. There's really no point in adding them now after landing UTEP. Las Cruces is a small market and only 50 miles from El Paso. It's not technically the same market but it may as well be.
Not saying UTEP was a better add but 700k potential viewers vs 100k is massive.
I think there are plenty of better options than NMSU at this point. I'm not bashing NMSU just saying with UNM and UTEP they become redundant. I think you'd rather add timezones.
Say MWC adds Toledo and NIU..I sure as crap would be also contacting WKU, Liberty Sam Houston and Texas State (again). WKU/Toledo and NIU would give Liberty travel partners for football. I'd even consider Liberty as Football only as well. WKU has been pretty solid in football and Sam Houston is playing well after moving up from FCS.
Doesn't do much for basketball but it increases footprint for football and adds Liberty who has some name value the last few years.
