LAS VEGAS — Mountain West Media Day, West Coast Conference Media Day or a 24-hour summit for teams headed to the new-look Pac-12 Conference?
At times, last week’s media gathering at Resorts World in Las Vegas could have passed as all three.
During a joint MWC/WCC Media Day, it was especially hard to ignore the elephant in the room — what with seven future Pac-12 members filtering in and out of large meeting rooms in Vegas, mingling with one another and finding different ways to answer many of the same questions about their conference affiliation after the 2025-26 season.
The most recent news development in the Pac-12 was naturally the most popular one last week in Vegas. Gonzaga, after years of exploratory conversations and closed-door meetings with conferences such as the Mountain West, Big East and Big-12, joined the Pac-12 earlier this month as its eighth official member and first nonfootball school.
“I just think when you start any conversation with a basketball conference that includes San Diego State and Gonzaga, it’s a good thing,” said San Diego State coach Brian Dutcher, whose Aztecs pulled out an 84-74 win over GU in Spokane last year and will host the Zags three weeks from now at Viejas Arena. “You look at West Coast Final Fours over the last 25 years, you’re talking about two of the teams that have been there. And I think UCLA being the third. I think Arizona went in 2001. So you’re talking about West Coast presence, West Coast powerhouses and I think any conference that starts with those two teams is a good thing.”
The Zags bring basketball pedigree into a conference that will feature two original Pac-12 members, Washington State and Oregon State, along with five defectors from the Mountain West: San Diego State, Boise State, Utah State, Colorado State and Fresno State.
An eighth football member is needed to qualify for FBS status, but that school hasn’t been identified.
“It’s massive. It’s kind of even hard to overstate that,” Colorado State coach Niko Medved said. “I know I was a huge proponent of (Gonzaga), I know John (Weber), our athletic director who’s here and our president Amy (Parsons). I was a proponent in Mountain West meetings.
“What are we doing? Do we have an opportunity? And I said, ‘Boy, if there’s anything we can do to add the Zags, that would be terrific.’ And when that news became official, again I think it’s just massive.”
For a midmajor conference in the current college basketball climate, seasons don’t get much better than 2023-24 in the Mountain West. The conference sent six teams to the NCAA Tournament and went 4-5, with SDSU, Utah State and Colorado State all winning at least one game and the Aztecs advancing through to the Sweet 16.
Washington State made its first NCAA Tournament appearance since 2008, and snagged an opening-round win against Drake.
“It’s exciting,” said new Cougars coach David Riley, who replaces Kyle Smith. “The league, when you look at the Pac-12, I mean the teams that are coming in it’s a really, really good basketball league. You’ve got multiple teams that have been to the Final Four and you look at the amount of teams that went to the NCAA Tournament every year, it’s going to be a battle every single night.”
Future Pac-12 teams accounted for seven total wins in last year’s tournament, including the two from Gonzaga, which cruised past McNeese State and Kansas before losing to top-seeded Purdue in the Sweet 16.
“Absolutely ecstatic,” Utah State’s Jerrod Calhoun said, recalling his reaction when the Gonzaga news became official. “I think anytime you can get in the same conference as the Zags, you’re heading in the right direction. I think what coach (Mark) Few and what Gonzaga’s done for college basketball’s been amazing. One of my favorite teams. I love the way they play, I love the way Arizona plays.
“We play a little bit similar style where we’re going to give our guys a lot of confidence, a lot of space and you want to play with pace.”
Boise State’s Leon Rice was clear about what GU brings to the new conference: “It legitimizes it in basketball.”
“Not that it wasn’t,” Rice said. “We’ve got some really good basketball teams that have gone to that league. I think one of the most important things too, because Mark’s such a big thinker. He’s going to help that league in a lot of ways that people don’t understand. Because there’s nothing he’ll settle for, he’s going to make it better by having Gonzaga and him in that league.”
Gonzaga’s addition amps up the pressure on other future Pac-12 members to invest resources into men’s basketball, knowing they’ll have to keep up with a school that’s made two national championship appearances, had 20 players drafted under Few and accumulated a 10-2 record against the sport’s “blue bloods” — UCLA, Duke, Kentucky, Kansas, North Carolina — over the past five years.
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