Collapse of the PAC-12: Oregon State & Washington State left in the dust

[The Marquis]

With Gonzaga departing the WCC, I think the next school that joins that conference will be California Baptist. No Inland Empire or Baptist institution has ever competed in the WCC. CBU would be the first with both distinctions.

That’s actually a pretty good idea. I can actually see it happening too.

 

[Spydey629]

If NMSU is also poached by the MW, I see C-USA adding two Eastern Time Zone schools.

Next year, there will be 6 Central Time Zone schools in the conference, and adding two in ETZ allows for the divisions to be divided along time zone lines, as there would then be 6 ETZ schools as well. Furman and Wofford would be nice additions to C-USA.

The Sun Belt is the only FBS conference still using divisions. The old PSAC rule no longer applies.

C-USA could add ETZ schools to keep the travel semi-even, but it is not necessary.

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

The Sun Belt is the only FBS conference still using divisions. The old PSAC rule no longer applies.

C-USA could add ETZ schools to keep the travel semi-even, but it is not necessary.

Doesn't mean CUSA can't go back to divisions.

 

[Spydey629]

Doesn't mean CUSA can't go back to divisions.

Why would they? There is literally no point.

 

[Takuto Maruki]

Why would they? There is literally no point.

So they can sell stock to The CW, of course.

 

[KevFu]

For a little dose of reality... of the Schools we've been talking about on here... here are their 2023 athletic budgets (the average for FCS is 19m):

Sacramento State - 45m
Texas State - 40m
UTSA - 44m
UNT - 49m
Montana - 24m
Montana State - 28m
Weber State - 17m

A couple of others with sizeable numbers:

UC Davis - 48m
North Dakota - 33m
North Dakota State - 32m
Cal Poly - 40m

For a comparison here's the new look Pac-7

Oregon State - 98m
Washington State - 90m
San Diego State - 96m
Fresno State - 51m
Boise State - 58m
Utah State - 51m
Colorado State - 64m

I'd imagine with the additional revenue the Montana Schools could get to $40m pretty easily, and Sac State could VERY easily with a stadium renovation and the additional revenue. I wonder what the new minimum budget requirement is for the Pac. I think it was $60 prior to this year, but don't quote me on that.

One thing I'd point out on using budgets is that they aren't really apples to apples in both directions.

Like Washington St and Oregon St have huge budgets compared to everyone they just invited from the MWC... but the biggest difference accounting for all that is that WSU/OSU have been getting Pac-10/Pac-12 money from TV for decades, selling tickets to home games against Pac-12 schools for decades, and those other teams have been getting WAC/MWC TV revenue for decades, while rarely if ever getting home opponents like Pac-12 schools to sell a ton of tickets too.

It's a two-way street. Revenues are going to go up when you elevate conferences; A from TV money, B from scheduling and C from just overall excitement.

Look at Tulane in C-USA vs now in the American. They got like $7m annually from moving to the AAC, they renovated/built new facilities and got people actually excited for Tulane athletics. They've gone from "Adding Tulane was the final straw that caused the Big East to split" to "the ideal adds for the Pac-12 are Memphis and Tulane."


You want to look for the things that DON'T change, or can't change. Like Texas State being near both Austin and San Antonio and having 40,0000 students. Schools don't shrink very often. That makes them "The next UCF." UCF was a BIG SCHOOL in a small conference, so when they committed to athletics, you can see how they played their way up.


The other thing with Grand Canyon is that they've had internal discussions about adding football and they have money. They could add football to join the Pac-12, and the Pac-12 could consider it because if they had just opened a new stadium for their new FBS team already, they're on the Pac-12's wishlist somewhere near Fresno St and UNLV. They'd probably be the team added before Utah St and the Pac-12 would be at eight right now.

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

If the NCAA changes the FBS minimum to 7 members and the MW adds NMSU, I could see Air Force and Colorado State playing each other in a non-conference game every year on Thanksgiving weekend.

The conference games in the Pac-12 that weekend would then be:
Boise State-Utah State
Fresno State-San Diego State
Oregon State-Washington State

The conference games in the MW on Thanksgiving weekend could be:
Hawaii-San Jose State
Nevada-UNLV
New Mexico-Wyoming
New Mexico State-UTEP