So I heard from an old friend who is both a BYU and UNLV booster (he's got degrees from both, but leans towards BYU). He used to be a fount of inside info when BYU was still in the conference, but he always had more BYU juice than UNLV juice. But I digress.
He intimated that UNLV and BYU are currently collaborating on forming a new conference and poaching the schools from the top half of the MWC (he mentioned Boise, SDSU, and UNM and that USU had an outside shot because BYU likes having the instate games and is super mad at Utah) as well as poaching several school from the American Conference (didn't get to specific here but he did mention UConn, Houston, SMU, Memphis, and Cincinnati). He says that for BYU losing Bronco to UVA was the final nail in the independent football coffin and the boosters are pressing to get back into a decent conference that they're pretty sure they can control or at least have a large say in. They were sure that they'd be as relevant as the Lavell Edwards days, but it's really hard to be a national power and an independent. They also have been less than pleased with WCC basketball--too many small schools and not enough interest even regionally--though personally I think they thought they could rule over Gonzaga there, and now that they've been there 5 years with no top 25 rankings and 2 wins in play-in games and never having won the WCC they're missing the way things were. He says UNLV is tired of the MWC as well and sees the move as a chance to get a better financial slice of the pie but made it clear that was all conjecture based on rumors and hearsay--he's not nearly as well connected at UNLV as he is at BYU.
So to summarize. BYU and UNLV are spearheading a new national conference headhunting the top schools of the MWC and American conference. He said that the sports included would probably be at least Football and Basketball, with Golf and Baseball a very high probability. He didn't mention anything as far as travel issues, divisions within the conference, olympic sports, total number of teams, or anything about TV issues or conference payouts. This guy was a very reliable source back in the day. Take it for what it's worth. If anyone has any deep UNLV contacts it might be worth probing a little to see if we can get any corroboration with someone that's a big booster or in the AD.
He intimated that UNLV and BYU are currently collaborating on forming a new conference and poaching the schools from the top half of the MWC (he mentioned Boise, SDSU, and UNM and that USU had an outside shot because BYU likes having the instate games and is super mad at Utah) as well as poaching several school from the American Conference (didn't get to specific here but he did mention UConn, Houston, SMU, Memphis, and Cincinnati). He says that for BYU losing Bronco to UVA was the final nail in the independent football coffin and the boosters are pressing to get back into a decent conference that they're pretty sure they can control or at least have a large say in. They were sure that they'd be as relevant as the Lavell Edwards days, but it's really hard to be a national power and an independent. They also have been less than pleased with WCC basketball--too many small schools and not enough interest even regionally--though personally I think they thought they could rule over Gonzaga there, and now that they've been there 5 years with no top 25 rankings and 2 wins in play-in games and never having won the WCC they're missing the way things were. He says UNLV is tired of the MWC as well and sees the move as a chance to get a better financial slice of the pie but made it clear that was all conjecture based on rumors and hearsay--he's not nearly as well connected at UNLV as he is at BYU.
So to summarize. BYU and UNLV are spearheading a new national conference headhunting the top schools of the MWC and American conference. He said that the sports included would probably be at least Football and Basketball, with Golf and Baseball a very high probability. He didn't mention anything as far as travel issues, divisions within the conference, olympic sports, total number of teams, or anything about TV issues or conference payouts. This guy was a very reliable source back in the day. Take it for what it's worth. If anyone has any deep UNLV contacts it might be worth probing a little to see if we can get any corroboration with someone that's a big booster or in the AD.
