Texas Christian might not need Colorado State or Utah to become bowl-eligible Saturday in order to skip the Mountain West Conference’s three contracted bowls for a bigger payout.
Going into the season, MWC commissioner Craig Thompson said the only way the league would send a champion to the Liberty Bowl in Memphis, Tenn., was if three other schools became bowl-eligible and filled the league’s existing contracts. Tuesday, however, Thompson said on a media conference call that the possibility exists of San Francisco’s Emerald Bowl skipping over the MWC.
In a three-bowl team scenario – TCU, Brigham Young and New Mexico being eligible from the MWC – the odd bowl out would be the San Francisco game.
Earlier, Thompson was not interested in letting the Emerald Bowl out of its commitment to the MWC if it would leave a bowl-eligible team home.
With that background, here is the latest MWC bowl speculation:
The Houston Bowl, with a $1.2 million payout and a Big 12 opponent, has moved to the forefront over the Liberty Bowl to get league champion TCU, which is No. 14 in the latest Bowl Championship Series standings.
The Las Vegas Bowl most likely will invite BYU as early as Saturday after the Cougars play rival Utah.
The Emerald Bowl probably will choose CSU, should the Rams become bowl-eligible, or Utah, if the Utes become bowl- eligible. It’s unlikely the Emerald Bowl wants back-to- back appearances by New Mexico. CSU completes it regular season Saturday at Nevada-Las Vegas.
That would leave San Diego’s first-year Poinsettia Bowl with New Mexico, which is bowl-eligible, or CSU, should the San Francisco bowl bring back New Mexico.
Also, the Fort Worth Bowl on the TCU campus has a contract to take an MWC team if the Big 12 can’t come up with an eighth bowl-eligible squad.
Patterson to K-State?
The MWC could lose the coach of its championship team for the second consecutive year.
Urban Meyer departed Utah for the Florida job a year ago.TCU’s Gary Patterson, a 1983 Kansas State graduate, said his phone started ringing at 6 a.m. Tuesday with friends calling about Bill Snyder’s retirement. None of those calls included official contact by the Big 12 school, but Patterson’s name was among the first to be floated in media reports on a possible successor.
“For me, my whole focus is on TCU,” said Patterson, whose team is 10-1. “Obviously everybody dreams about possibly having an opportunity to come back to their alma mater. TCU has been very good to me. I don’t have a comment one way or another. Right now we’re in the middle of recruiting and trying to make TCU the best it can be.”
Former CSU athletic director Tim Weiser heads the Kansas State athletic department and has close ties to former TCU athletic director Eric Hyman, now at South Carolina.
As for Wyoming’s Joe Glenn, whose name surfaces seemingly with every job opening in the Midwest, the Cowboys coach said: “I’m not interested one thousand times. I’ve got a great job, and I love what I got.”
Natalie Meisler can be reached at 303-820-1295 or nmeisler@denverpost.com.
