Canzano: The cost of playing in a new-world Pac-12
Concept saves OSU/WSU millions... but how many Mountain West schools could afford it?
No way around it, there are some bad feelings about how the Pac-12 has talked about the Mountain West Conference in the last year.
It chapped some of the MWC presidents, for example, when officials at Oregon State and Washington State wrinkled their noses and talked negatively about the possibility of reverse merger over the last year.
That scenario was positioned as a last-resort fallback plan and often referred to as “relegation.” One Mountain West source told me it felt like a slap in the face. After all, they’d thrown the Pac-12 a life preserver by fostering a football scheduling partnership for the 2024 season.
One of the scenarios now being whispered about involves the Pac-12 building the top West Coast football conference using some — but not all — of the schools in the Mountain West. A ‘self-selecting’ strategic plan could hypothetically save OSU and WSU millions, but it comes with a big question.
As in, how many Mountain West schools can afford to join the Pac-12?
Some things: