Mountain West fights off further Pac-12 poaching as schools agree to stay

The two-week turf war between the Pac-12 and Mountain West is over and has ended in … a draw? 

Kind of. 

After perhaps the most fragile 72-hour period in the 26-year history of the Mountain West Conference, the league announced Thursday that it had received signed memorandums of understanding from its remaining seven schools to keep the league together through the 2031-32 school year. 

“The agreements announced today mark a historic moment for the Mountain West and provide much-needed stability and clarity as the world of intercollegiate athletics continues to evolve rapidly,” commissioner Gloria Nevarez said in a statement. 

The agreement from those seven schools – Air Force, Hawaii, Nevada, New Mexico, San Jose State, UNLV and Wyoming – followed an effort by the Pac-12 to poach even more members after five schools joined Washington State and Oregon State in the resurrected league. 

Had the Pac-12 convinced UNLV to join, it could have started a domino effect that could have led to the dissolution of the Mountain West. 

Instead, Nevarez was able to keep the remaining group together by promising significant cash distributions of the $90 million in exit fees, of which Air Force and UNLV will receive roughly $22 million (24.5%), while others will receive around $14 million except for Hawaii, which is a member only in football and thus gets a $4.5 million payout. 

That doesn’t include the $55 million in so-called ‘poaching fees’ that the Mountain West is owed as a result of its previous scheduling agreement with Washington State and Oregon State. The Pac-12 sued the Mountain West this week, claiming that the poaching fees represented a violation of antitrust law. 

The split leaves both the Pac-12 and Mountain West needing to add members to reach the minimum of eight to qualify as a Football Bowl Subdivision conference. Among the schools who could be in consideration for both leagues are UTEP, New Mexico State, Texas State and a variety of FCS schools like Sacramento State that are looking to move up a level. 

Though it survived, the Mountain West was, of course, badly damaged when Washington State and Oregon State resurrected the Pac-12 and lured Boise State, Colorado State, Fresno State and San Diego State, which were historically among the four most successful football programs in the Mountain West. 

The new Pac-12’s initial expansion goals also focused on the American Athletic Conference, hoping to lure Memphis, Tulane, South Florida and UTSA. But those schools rejected the offer, citing uncertainty about the Pac-12’s media rights value and exit fees from the AAC that would have exceeded $20 million. 

The Pac-12 then went back to the pool of Mountain West schools but only convinced Utah State to jump as Nevarez scrambled to keep the league alive.