Mountain West Conference

Latest News Update About Mountain West Conference: Boise State’s new conference is about to get rocked by a second defection this summer, according to the Colorado State athletic department. Colorado State posted on Twitter late Tuesday that fellow Mountain West Conference member BYU will go independent in football and join the Western Athletic Conference in all other sports. A press conference is scheduled for Thursday, according to the post by @CSUFootball – the official Colorado State football Twitter account.



The Mountain West, which added Boise State for 2011 in June, already has lost Utah to the Pac-10.

ESPN.com’s Andy Katz reported Tuesday night, based on multiple sources, that “Utah’s move to the Pac-10 has given BYU the impetus to seriously explore the possibility of leaving the Mountain West …”

BYU’s departure would leave the Mountain West with eight schools and just two football powers – Boise State and TCU.

The Mountain West does not have an exit penalty as long as schools give notice by Sept. 1 the year before they want to leave.

WAC commissioner Karl Benson declined to comment when contacted by the Idaho Statesman late Tuesday. Asked whether the league had moved up its expansion timeline and if the league was negotiating with BYU to join as a non-football member, Benson replied via text message: “No comment.”

The WAC previously said it was shelving expansion until late this year or early next year.

BYU athletic director Tom Holmoe talked to the Statesman at the Associated Press Sports Editors convention in Salt Lake City in late June. He hinted that more conference shakeups were on the way.

“When is the next round? I think the dust will settle, but it will get kicked up again. I don’t know when that is,” Holmoe said. “And so every school, every individual school, including BYU and Boise State, will look out for their best interest. They owe it to themselves to do that. We look out for our best interest. We have for years.”