Nothing has changed and seemingly everything has changed heading into the Mountain West’s seventh year.
The league champion once again has no shot at playing in a Bowl Championship Series game unless it goes unbeaten and the stars align. As they did for Utah a year ago.
However, since Utah busted into the BCS, some of the edge seems to be missing from the expectation of the annual MWC vs. BCS leagues’ scoreboard.
“Our coaches understand we’ve got to have success,” MWC commissioner Craig Thompson said. “We can’t talk our way into an automatic berth.”
For a variety of reasons, no one is beating the “Beat the BCS” drum as loudly this year. Only one MWC team is guaranteed a victory this weekend, and that’s the UNLV-New Mexico winner.
The seven other games are against teams from BCS conferences, including three top-25 foes: TCU at No. 7 Oklahoma; Wyoming at No. 10 Florida and No. 22 Boston College at BYU.
Utah puts its 16-game winning streak on the line against an Arizona team it beat 23-6 last year.
“Obviously we got some people’s attention last year,” said new Utah coach Kyle Whittingham, who was the defensive coordinator a year ago. “They have Pac-10 facilities, they have a Pac-10 budget. There’s no reason they shouldn’t be good.”
His fellow first-year coach, Bronco Mendenhall, is doing everything he can to restore the once-proud tradition at BYU. Mendenhall has brought icon LaVell Edwards closer to the program, invited former players to speak during spring ball and picked uniforms more closely resembling the old Cougars style.
One of BYU’s traditions, even during recent down seasons, was upending BCS opponents.
“The team started well in openers with Notre Dame, Georgia Tech and Syracuse, then they weren’t able to sustain the initial momentum,” Mendenhall said. “For all of us in the league, the conference is the No. 1 objective.”
If San Diego State can upset UCLA this week in the battle of coaches on the hot seat, the MWC will have a two-game winning streak against the Bruins going back to Wyoming’s Las Vegas Bowl victory.
As for the league’s other in-state nonleague rivalry, it wouldn’t matter to Colorado State if Colorado played in a BCS conference or the Sun Belt.
Footnotes
There were two preseason quarterback battles, and the incumbent won both. At San Diego State, sophomore part-time starter Kevin O’Connell beat out redshirt freshman Darren Mougey. At UNLV, junior part-time starter Shane Steichen held off junior college transfer Jarrod Jackson. …
UNLV and New Mexico kick off at 11 a.m. Monday. The coaches weren’t happy to open with a conference game or play on Monday, but TV (ESPN2) beckoned.
Natalie Meisler can be reached at 303-820-1295 or nmeisler@denverpost.com.
