Mountain West Conference carousel

Welcome back, Boise State. It’s like you never left the Mountain West Conference.

In fact, the Broncos never did leave. This week, Boise State announced the university was backing out of its previous commitment to join the Big East Conference in football this fall. Over the past few weeks, the Big East has endured more defections than the Cuban national baseball team, and the Mountain West proved to be a far more stable, logical league for the Broncos.

This is good news for UNLV, which is a founding member of the Mountain West. Boise State, with its perennial Top 25 football program and blue field turf, joined the Mountain West two years ago. Losing the Broncos on the heels of departures by Texas Christian, Brigham Young and Utah would have weakened the Mountain West and UNLV’s ability to subsidize its athletic program with shared revenue.

Conference realignment creates hard feelings among institutions, as longtime partners split in pursuit of more attractive ones. It’s to the Mountain West’s credit that its members recognized the value of Boise State’s membership and were willing to make substantial concessions to hasten the Broncos’ return, including allowing Boise State to have a separate television contract for its home football games.

Now that the Mountain West has regained its footing, it can turn its attention to growth. Longtime Mountain West member San Diego State was supposed to join Boise State in the Big East next year in football and the Big West in other sports. The Aztecs are UNLV’s biggest conference rival in men’s basketball and occupy the conference’s biggest population center. UNLV administrators should convince other member institutions to keep the Aztecs in the Mountain West.

The sooner that relationship is reconciled, the sooner the Mountain West can focus on adding institutions that might further strengthen its hand, such as Brigham Young and other incoming Big East members who want out.

Why is conference growth important to the Mountain West and UNLV? Because these affiliations raise the profiles of member institutions within their regions and beyond. They help student and faculty recruitment and fundraising.

There was a time not long ago that the Mountain West seemed poised to fade into obscurity, picked apart by rival leagues. Now it’s doing the picking.