5 questions for Mountain West football in the 2018-19 season
As the Mountain West enters its 20th football season, the conference has lot of issues on the horizon. The league’s media days are Tuesday and Wednesday at The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas, and Commissioner Craig Thompson’s round-table discussion Tuesday morning will address some of these questions:
1. Will Boise State make a New Year’s Six game?
The defending conference champion Broncos are favorites to win the Mountain West, which automatically puts them in the conversation for one of the top six bowl games. Boise State doesn’t play a difficult schedule, but does face Oklahoma State on the road Sept. 15. Should the Broncos pull off a victory there, they would be in great position for such a game. Even a loss, at least a close one, wouldn’t be a killer.
Making such games is enormously important for a Group of Five conference. Central Florida’s appearance in last season’s Peach Bowl resulted in $4 million for the American Athletic Conference.
2. How will the bowl situation shake out?
The Las Vegas Bowl has received the first choice from the Mountain West since 2006, but new bowl contracts soon will be announced. With the Las Vegas Bowl moving into the new Raiders’ stadium in 2020, that has put its future with the Mountain West in question.
The local bowl has a number of options, including whether to play one or two games. A matchup between two Power Five programs would be attractive for the bowl, but there are questions about finances and logistics that could make such a pairing difficult to secure while keeping the Mountain West in the picture as a bowl partner.
3. What is going on with the TV deals?
Contracts with ESPN, CBS Sports and AT&T SportsNet each have two years remaining, so there isn’t enormous urgency, but it’s a topic that is looming because the next round of deals will shape the conference for years to come. The Mountain West doesn’t want to fall into a Conference USA situation. That league reached deals in 2016 that dropped payouts from $1.1 million per school each year to $200,000, according to Norfolk’s Virginian-Pilot.
Securing a quality TV deal is a problem for Group of Five conferences, which don’t have the negotiating strength of a Power Five. The Mountain West, which pays each school $1.1 million through the TV contracts, also has to decide how much it wants to use digital coverage, as opposed to more traditional TV contracts, and assert more say over game times.
4. Which coaches feel the most heat?
New Mexico’s Bob Davie had a disastrous offseason, getting served a month-long suspension for allegedly trying to obstruct a criminal investigation of his players. Given that New Mexico also went 3-9 last season, Davie can’t be feeling too secure. Utah State’s Matt Wells bought himself some time last season by taking the Aggies from 3-9 the year before to a bowl. But the heat isn’t completely off him.
5. Which team is this year’s Fresno State?
Jeff Tedford pulled off a remarkable coaching job in his first season with the Bulldogs, leading them to the West Division championship. Air Force comes off a 5-7 season and not much is expected of the Falcons, but 12th-year coach Troy Calhoun should never be underestimated.
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Contact Mark Anderson at manderson@reviewjournal.com. Follow @markanderson65 on Twitter.
New rule
Game results rather than polls now will determine which football team hosts the Mountain West championship.
The team with the best conference record will host the title game between divisional winners. If the records are the same, the team that won the head-to-head meeting will host. Other tiebreakers follow if a determination still can’t be made.
Boise State hosted last year’s game against Fresno State because the Broncos had the higher composite ranking in the four polls. Both teams were 7-1, but Fresno State had won the head-to-head meeting 28-17. Under the new parameters, the Bulldogs would have hosted.
The Broncos beat Fresno State 17-14 in the title game and advanced to the Las Vegas Bowl. They went on to beat Oregon 38-28 in Las Vegas.
