Amidst a busy college football Week 5, conference realignment is still underway as well. With the Mountain West Conference being raided by the Pac-12 in recent weeks, the Mountain West is now looking to add teams, and they have reportedly turned to the Lone Star State.
According to ESPN’s Pete Thamel, the Mountain West Conference has invited Texas State to join their conference. A decision is expected in the days ahead.
Texas State is currently in the Sun Belt Conference, which they have been a member of since 2013. Prior to that, Texas State was in the WAC for one season (2012), FCS Independent in 2011 and in the Southland for over two decades before that (1987-2010).
The Mountain West has six full-time members, and Texas State would give it seven. It needs eight full-time members to meet conference minimum requirements, with the announcement of the upcoming departures of Fresno State, Boise State, San Diego State, Colorado State and Utah State for the Pac-12.
Right now, the six full-time members are UNLV, Air Force, Nevada, San Jose State, New Mexico and Wyoming, while Hawai’i is a football member. The Pac-12 also needs one additional member, as it currently sits at seven.
Texas State football has been on the upswing in recent years, finishing third or better in the Sun Belt in three of the last four seasons. Although the Bobcats haven’t finished atop a conference since 2005 in their FCS days when they won the Southland Conference under former head coach David Bailiff. That Bobcats team ended up reaching the FCS semifinals where they lost to Northern Iowa.
Texas State is 2-2 on the early season, with wins over Lamar and UTSA, along with losses to Arizona State and Sam Houston State. They’ll hit the road next week and play Troy on Thursday, October 3rd.
