long term, I feel like the only way UNLV survives is a power conference invite. A lot of off the field progress has been made, very little on field. But ultimately, that’s where UNLV has to land.
But that is going to be several seasons away if it happens.
So what do we do short term? For once, I actually like the overall direction that the MWC is going. Not right now, the league sucks, but soon we will be a “real” league. You’ve seen the articles and I’m not going to get into any nitty gritty details as I have heard them over the past 5 days.... but everybody in the MWC better step it up, I think the new MWC will become a three bid league in the worst of years, 4 or 5 in most years. We’ve heard the Zags thing, that’s going to happen. Hopefully for next season. Oh, the Zags will benefit monetarily more than they do in the WCC, but so will the rest of the MWC. It will be win/win, we will ride Gonzaga for exposure and legitimacy, they’ll be on a more visible platform.
Yes, I fully expect BYU to join us in basketball which I think is great. I don’t think it’ll be football though. However, I do think you’ll see BYU as an “unofficial” football member in that they will keep their TV but they’ll play about half their Indy schedule against MWC teams.
But I don’t think it stops there. If things go as hoped, basketball will gain even more and it will be significant.
I think all this is a wise decision by the MWC. They’re essentially saying we will play football, but as a conference, we cannot compete with the big boys. May as well face the reality and deal with it rather than whine and cry about it and hope for the best. Instead, it appears the focus is to become a top 5 basketball conference for the primary revenue source. At least that is feasible.
When this all happens, it will be exciting. We will end up with some very worthy conference games, which, coincidentally, affords a weaker OOC, not that I’m ever a fan of weak OOC’s. But in a multibid conference with ranked teams, you can afford to hold back a bit in OOC.
If we are lucky, at least some of this dust settles before next basketball season. I expect all this particular dust to settle before the next two years.
But that is going to be several seasons away if it happens.
So what do we do short term? For once, I actually like the overall direction that the MWC is going. Not right now, the league sucks, but soon we will be a “real” league. You’ve seen the articles and I’m not going to get into any nitty gritty details as I have heard them over the past 5 days.... but everybody in the MWC better step it up, I think the new MWC will become a three bid league in the worst of years, 4 or 5 in most years. We’ve heard the Zags thing, that’s going to happen. Hopefully for next season. Oh, the Zags will benefit monetarily more than they do in the WCC, but so will the rest of the MWC. It will be win/win, we will ride Gonzaga for exposure and legitimacy, they’ll be on a more visible platform.
Yes, I fully expect BYU to join us in basketball which I think is great. I don’t think it’ll be football though. However, I do think you’ll see BYU as an “unofficial” football member in that they will keep their TV but they’ll play about half their Indy schedule against MWC teams.
But I don’t think it stops there. If things go as hoped, basketball will gain even more and it will be significant.
I think all this is a wise decision by the MWC. They’re essentially saying we will play football, but as a conference, we cannot compete with the big boys. May as well face the reality and deal with it rather than whine and cry about it and hope for the best. Instead, it appears the focus is to become a top 5 basketball conference for the primary revenue source. At least that is feasible.
When this all happens, it will be exciting. We will end up with some very worthy conference games, which, coincidentally, affords a weaker OOC, not that I’m ever a fan of weak OOC’s. But in a multibid conference with ranked teams, you can afford to hold back a bit in OOC.
If we are lucky, at least some of this dust settles before next basketball season. I expect all this particular dust to settle before the next two years.
