Canzano: Pac-12 and Mountain West skirmish heats up
Pac-12 files complaint vs. MW.
I knew the Pac-12 was annoyed with the Mountain West Conference but didn’t grasp how pissed it was until Tuesday.
The Pac-12 unveiled its hard feelings in a complaint filed in the Northern District of California. The conference wants the poaching penalties that were included in the scheduling agreement with the MWC deemed illegal by a judge.
It wants the court to know that it tried to work reasonably with the Mountain West but felt pushed around, bullied, and backed into a corner.
It wants an open market.
It wants UNLV — basically.
The lawyers win again, right? They usually do. But I read the court filing and came away thinking about conversations I had with both parties in recent weeks.
Pac-12 staff was frustrated as it ended the negotiation to extend the football scheduling agreement with the MW earlier this month. On the Sunday night when negotiations broke down, one source called the MW’s position “delusional.”
The court filing on Tuesday underscored that. It indicated that the Mountain West aimed to boost the annual scheduling payout from $14 million this season to $30 million next season.
A MW executive confirmed that the conference upped the asking price to $30 million. But only did so as a negotiating ploy after the Pac-12 made the Mountain West thought was a lowball offer — $7 million.
As I previously reported, Mountain West Commissioner Gloria Nevarez was accused by Oregon State and Washington State of blocking their attempts to schedule non-conference games with her schools. Nevarez told me she was simply following long-standing conference policy. The Beavers and Cougars rolled their eyes at that.
It turns out the sides weren’t just wrangling and bickering about football scheduling.
They were both plotting.