Mountain West, Conference USA to merge in 2013-14

Realignment has shaken college athletics, leaving leagues such as the Mountain West Conference and Conference USA to wonder and worry what the future holds.

Both leagues took a step Monday to re-establish some control, agreeing to form up to a 24-school conference that will stretch from the East Coast to Hawaii in football starting in the 2013-14 academic year and cover nearly the width of the Lower 48 in other sports.

Under the current arrangement, 16 football teams would make up the new conference and 15 schools in other sports. Hawaii joins in football only.

The schools involved are the following:

■ UNLV, Air Force, Colorado State, New Mexico and Wyoming, which all compete in the Mountain West.

■ Alabama-Birmingham, East Carolina, Marshall, Rice, Southern Mississippi, Texas-El Paso, Tulane and Tulsa, which all compete in Conference USA.

■ Fresno State, Nevada and Hawaii, which all compete in the Western Athletic Conference but are set to join the Mountain West in 2012.

UNLV President Neal Smatresk, who also serves as chairman of the Mountain West's board of directors, was the driving force behind the merger.

"We have been frustrated with the lack of stability of our conference," Smatresk said. "Members of both conferences have been siphoned off in this national athletic conference plundering movement. We need to stabilize our conferences and form an entity we think recommits to the high values of student athletic competition. So we ... are going to take a high-road approach to how college athletics are run."

Smatresk said many details are still being worked out, and a formal agreement likely will be reached fairly soon.

Among those details:

■ Television partners. Many Mountain West insiders and fans have complained about a national TV deal that has provided what they viewed as too little exposure. Some new national TV package is expected, which could spell the end of the more regionally targeted The Mtn.

■ Scheduling. UNLV basketball fans shouldn't worry about annual home-and-home series with Marshall and Southern Mississippi. Though there probably will be some crossover games, the schedules will be more region-based, probably using two divisions that mirror the current conference setups.

■ Postseason scheduling. Bowl contracts and conference tournaments will have to be ironed out. One intriguing possibility is a four-team conference football playoff. "It would be our intention to have a two-tiered playoff system," Smatresk said.

■ Leadership. Mountain West commissioner Craig Thompson or his C-USA counterpart, Britton Banowsky, probably will oversee the new conference. A rumor has spread that Thompson will get the job, but Smatresk and UNLV athletic director Jim Livengood said no decision has been reached.

There also are myriad other issues, such as whether to expand and what to call the new league, that also must be decided.

The Mountain West also is dealing with the uncertainty of whether Boise State, which was scheduled to start playing football in the Big East Conference in 2013 and rejoin the Western Athletic Conference in other sports, will depart this year instead. If the Broncos leave, Smatresk said they would owe the Mountain West a $9 million exit fee.

Boise State's apparent wavering is a major example of why both conferences are combining, even if it creates an easy target on Twitter.

"I think it's a great move," Livengood said. "It's looking to the future. It makes sense. We have to work through a number of details, but it's very positive and exciting. It needed to be done, and it needed to be done now."

UNLV men's basketball coach Dave Rice said he completely backed Smatresk and Livengood.

"We're excited about the direction," Rice said. "We've enjoyed our association with the Mountain West Conference and are excited about the future of Runnin' Rebel basketball. I've always said and I've always believed that UNLV transcends conference."

Baseball coach Tim Chambers said he liked the idea of adding some quality schools, especially because the Mountain West will field only five teams this season and six next year.

"We're dwindling away a little bit," Chambers said. "Playing teams in a conference six times apiece is tough, and this year we've got 30 conference games. I think that's really tough, too.

"I welcome Tulane and Rice and Southern Miss, and those are some really good baseball programs I think will in turn give us more than just one (NCAA regional) bid."

Football coach Bobby Hauck, citing the university's preference that Smatresk be the spokesman on this issue, opted not to comment.

Even as Smatresk touted the virtues of uniting with C-USA, he condemned the forces that drove the two parties to this point.

"We feel that what's been going on in college athletics is all driven by money and not by the right principles," Smatresk said. "We are committing ourselves to providing our athletes a stable environment so that we do the things we're supposed to do, which is have great competition in a fair way with reasonable cost controls."

Contact reporter Mark Anderson at
manderson@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2914. Follow him on Twitter: @markanderson65.