This Podcast Is... Uncalled For - Thoughts on College Realignment and the Death of the WAC

Episode Date: September 19, 2025

College realignment (specifically at the NCAA Division I level) is getting ridiculous.  It's effectively put one major conference (the Pac-12) into a coma, from which it will be relegated to mid-major status; and will likely be killing off another conference, the WAC (Western Athletic Conference).  Mike (whose alma mater was at one time a school in the WAC) reads a few articles on the subject and shares his thoughts. Update: On July 1, 2026, the WAC will cease to exist, being replaced by the United Athletic Conference (UAC).

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Can't you see there's so much more laughs and tales you can't ignore A journey that will leave you floor In the night or in the day Just press play we're on our way Voice a sharp opinion, Bright, talking through the day and nine, guessing hosts and everybody, welcome to the podcast. Let's talk college realignments and its effects on smaller school conferences.

And potentially the death of one of those conferences. So we got the tournament going on. right now as we're speaking we're in the sweet 16 uh i bracket looks like shit all right out of the um 16 and uh of those uh all 16 are in the uh big conferences the acc the SEC the SEC big 10 big 12 7 in the SEC alone and i and uh that is uh Bizarre to me, they knocked out all the mid-majors for those who aren't familiar with college basketball, certainly D1, college basketball, the term mid-major refers to any school or conference outside of the big boys. So, yeah, technically. Technically, those conferences,

the 31 total, actually 32, but it'll be 31 soon. Oh, because of this conference in alignment centered around football. Never mind the other sports. Never mind that it now makes no goddamn sense geographically. The Pact 12 was a victim of all this, all this football greed.

And that helped kick off possibly the death of another conference all together. So what happened? which is predominantly a Midwestern conference. Decided, oh, let's pick up USC and UCLA. Oh, and while we're out, we're also going to poach, Oregon and Washington. So, yeah, four schools on the West Coast and the rest in the, mostly the Midwest, and the, and a little in the northeast, too, with Rutgers and Penn State.

in Maryland and then we also at the Big 12 which is also predominantly a Midwestern conference with Texas and also geographically

challenge meaning okay you kind of made West Virginia makes sense when we brought in Cincinnati but Central Florida no that makes no goddamn sense they poach from the

Pact 12 Arizona States, Colorado and Utah that's reuniting Utah with BYU.Y. And then

lastly you had Cal and Stanford both the Bay Area schools going to the ACC, the these two Pacific Coast

schools joining the Atlantic Coast Conference makes no goddamn sense the ACC of course start off as a Southern Conference and now pretty much

run the entire length of the Atlantic Coast so Boston College Syracuse Pet formerly Maryland but then you then you still have to explain

Louisville and Notre Dame for non-football and bringing in Southern Methodists in Texas so we've reached a point where college sports makes no goddamn sense

in the big conferences and it has a not going to effect on the smaller conferences and that brings us to what's left of the pack 12 with Oregon State and Washington State so they to credit decide yeah we're going to stick stick with it and keep this conference going somehow and we're going to start inviting some high-level mid-majures to uh to join us so starting in 2026 recording this in 2025 so it'll be another year before this actually happens they are bringing in san Diego states Fresno State Colorado State

Utah State Boise States and Gonzaga the funny thing is that that brings them up to eight which is the minimum you need for a conference. Excuse me. But Gonzaga, that makes sense geographically, Spokane, Washington, but they don't have a football team. So they still need to find another school to a field football. But I said this has a knock-on effect on smaller conferences,

and we may wind up losing a conference. all together one that is quite historic involves a lot of the schools that we've talked about so far that conference of course is the WAC the Western Ethnic Conference which over the over its entire existence have had quite a few schools forty three schools total and I should point that all of them are Still, Division I to this day. And most of them can be classed as mid-majors, and some of them are major schools. All right.

Before I read the article, I'll just go over the list of schools that we're talking about here. So the current March 25, 2025, the current alignment of the Western Athletics, that conference, the whack is such. Abilene Christian University in Texas. California Baptist. California, I think that's obvious. Grand Canyon University. You may have seen the ads on YouTube.

They are out of Phoenix, Arizona. Seattle University, I think that's obvious. Southern Utah University out of Cedar City, Utah. in southern Utah. Tarleton State, I believe that's a Texas school. To UT Arlington, Texas.

Utah Tech, which is in St. George, Utah, that's even further south than southern Utah. Also the home of the first LDS temple that's actually operating in Utah Valley. I think they're in Orm, Utah

So that's the current alignment Here's the Here's the schools that used to be in the Wack And some of them Stanley, well, the Man West was spun off from the Wack So here we go

We have Air Force We have Arizona They're now in the Big 12 Arizona state also in the big 12 Boise states it just heard me say they're pack 12 pounds BYU also in the big 12 now Cal State Bakersville there's Fresna State's States we all right says they're going to the back 12th Chicago State oh man man what's Chicago doing there was Chicago State

represents the easternmost reach all time of this particular league Colorado State you heard me talk about earlier gone to the pack 12 Denver currently in the 7th League Hawaii stop saying Hawaii in there Idaho at home makes sense and we come to the school that's piqued my interest in covering this UMKC yes we were

at one point a whack school in fact our only college basketball post season experience came as a whack school also on this list

of interest to me Lamar University in Beaumont Texas the alma of both my parents was at one point in the whack Louisiana Tech

Charlie Bradshaw's alma mater UNLV University of Nevada Las Vegas University of Nevada and Reno New Mexico New Mexico State

Rice University in Houston San Diego State Pact 12 Sam Houston State, which is in Texas, San Jose State, SMU, Southern Methodist University in the ACC, again, makes no geographic sense. State of Austin State University, Nakedosius, Texas, the bus that connects Longview to Houston to Houston, if you travel by Amphi, track to Houston will stop not too

far from this campus TCU, Texas Christian University in the Big 12 U-TEP University of Texas El Paso and there's another family tie there one of my distant cousins

played football there and we have his jersey framed at the house UTRGV University of Texas Rio Grande Valley All right I believe we split there and I believe

Justin Leathers the former Johnson County Cavalier wound up there UT San Antonio Texas State the alma mater of LBJ Tulsa Utah now in the big 12 so a lot of big 12 schools were at one point

WAC schools Utah State Pack 12 bound and the team that beat us in our only basketball postseason Wyoming so so that's an impressive list of schools to play in that conference and it's sad that it's gone away unless they poach schools from Division 2

which I'm not sure if that's going to happen but that would have to be the only way that this conference stays intact and nothing wrong with it because schools come up all the time from

D2, D3 even St. Thomas and the N.A.A.A. A.A. Look at you, London Wood. Now to Vision One. But, yeah, certainly caught the attention of at least one writer. So this was the SB Nation site. Mid-major Madness. This article was written by Lance Hartzler. on February 27, 2025, and is entitled Whack Hits by Conference Re-enalignment Again. Matt Brown reports that Southern Utah, Cal Baptist, and Utah Valley are eyeing exits from the much maligned league. Another day in conference rate alignment, another chance for the Western Athletic Conference.

to implode feels like deja vu to tell you the truth the whack can't hold on

to the teams that brought in via the great whack expansion

of the late 2010s and early 2020 20s or

any of the teams that brought up from the non D1 ranks

on Tuesday morning Matt Brown confirmed some reports in his extra

Points newsletter. Go subscribe. Matt does awesome work. That the Big West is set to formally vote on the idea of inviting Cal Baptist in Utah Valley and that

Southern Utah is looking for way out of the conference. Brown confirmed reports from early February that the Big West was looking towards the wax schools after losing UC Davis and Hawaii to the new look mountain west brown noted a key distinction voting on the teams versus actually inviting per brown the big west seems

more enthusiastic about inviting Utah Valley a departure from the league's calcentric membership and that there could be reservations about Cal Baptist, which could be because of its status as a private non-U.C. School. Utah Valley was added to the WAC in 2013, I think the same time as UMKC was, while Cal Baptist joined in 2018. Utah Valley and potentially Utah, excuse me, backtrack, Southern Utah and potentially Utah Tech could be on the move to the Summit League per A reports as well as partial members. So about that, when I was at UMKC, we were in the Mid-ContConnor conference, which became the Summit League

after I graduated and one of our rifles in that conference was in fact southern Utah. In fact I have a funny security story. Well funny on my end. I'm not sure about the kids but

one night doing security at the four points which no longer stands by the way got torn down and yeah the the most odd-looking hill there now at the art museum's stop with the streetcar extension Utah Valley was actually staying at the hotel that night's having just played the ruse

and one of the players comes down with a unpopped bag of popcorn and I agree to a album out and wind up burning of the popcorn. Not intentionally, to me. It was kind of funny. So, yeah. Let's continue with the article. There's a tweet here. So, so, so, so, yeah. Let's continue with the article. There is a tweet here Dom Isle Mike has been on this for about a year I was told that it's likely southern Utah and Utah Tech will be added to the

Summit League soon League would be at 11 schools which is still not ideal the school's football programs will remain in the UAC and the Utah bolted from the big sky in 22, while Utah Tech joined in 2020. By the way, the current setup of the Summit League is, yes, UMKC,

Oro Roberts, Denver, University of Nebraska, University of Nebraska, Omaha, South Dakota, South Dakota State, North Dakota, North Dakota states, and San Thomas, which is in Minneapolis. So that would, indeed, bring us to 11, so we'll need to find one more to even than at 12. the whack had the makings of an honest-to-god good mid-majorly helmed by New Mexico State now in Conference USA Grand Canyon bound for the Mountain West Ambelene Christian still there Utah Valley Big West and Cal Baptist Big West now the whack looks alone empty in the coming years

the WAC only has the following teams as members for now least Charlton State UT Arlington and Avaline Christian 3 Texas schools and ACU was one of the

founding members of the historic WAC expansion I am a genuinely winly flabbergasted about where the conference goes from here if the move pans out the whack have been decimated a number of times since its inception in 1962 has tried to rebuild itself over and over from starting off with current b yu arizona arizona states in big 12 to

former Hawaii Boise State and Idaho and to whatever the last imagination looked the whack has taken on different identities the past 60 years

well the 43 different schools but that's identity is not existence or at the least unclear what it might be maybe and I'm sorry to write this it might be time to let the dream go so so if that is the case uh rest in peace to the western ethnic conference um maybe those texas schools get picked up by the southland

uh we'll see but uh i think that's uh going to do it's uh going to do it for this edition really screwed up what's going on with Division I College Athletics all in the name of football and it almost murder death the big 12 but they're about to do a Jesus-like thing in the coming years being like Sam Kinnison talking about how Jesus was They're very, not that, not that it, not that it, uh, bridge or weekends or anything, uh, but the Pact 12 was dead. Do I say that you fucking bitch, I was dead. I think we'll leave it at that, so we'll talk again soon. This podcast is uncalled for is hosted, produced, and edited by myself, Mike Chernevsky.

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