Report: MWC to lose a key tie-in

Postseason game is to feature Power-5 schools

Progressively, Vegas is going big-time in sports. In the process, it appears, the Mountain West Conference is a loser.

Thursday, independent journalist Brett McMurphy reported that the Las Vegas Bowl is planning to sever its longstanding tie-in with the Mountain West.

Instead, McMurphy wrote, citing anonymous sources, the Las Vegas Bowl will match teams from the Pac-12 and another Power Five conference, possibly the SEC.

The move would be a damaging blow to the MWC, which would be left without a bowl tie-in with a Power Five conference.

Until last year, Las Vegas — for all its wealth and glitz — was a minor-league sports town. Then, the Vegas Golden Knights entered the National Hockey League. Not far behind are the NFL’s Oakland Raiders, who plan to move to Vegas and into a brand-new stadium in 2020.

The Las Vegas Bowl-MWC tie-in would end at that point, McMurphy wrote.

The UNLV football team is expected to become a co-tenant at the new stadium.

It appears the Las Vegas Bowl has come to the conclusion that it has outgrown the Mountain West — though UNLV is an MWC member school.

The report has not been confirmed by the Las Vegas Bowl or by the MWC.

The past several years, the Las Vegas Bowl has been the preferred site for the Mountain West champion. McMurphy, formerly of espn.com, speculated that the Arizona Bowl (Tucson) might inherit that status after the Las Vegas Bowl’s exit.

As of now the Mountain West has tieins with the Las Vegas Bowl (Pac-12), the Gildan New Mexico Bowl (Albuquerque, Conference USA), the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl (Boise, Mid-American), the Nova Home Loans Arizona Bowl (Sun Belt) and the Hawaii Bowl (Honolulu, American Athletic). The MWC lost a tie-in when the Poinsettia Bowl, based in San Diego, folded after the 2016 season.

McMurphy reported that there’s a possibility of a Mountain West tie-in with a new bowl game in Tempe, Ariz.

The Mountain West’s relationship with the Las Vegas Bowl dates to 1999, the conference’s first season. A MWC team has played in the game every year since except for 2015, when it matched Utah of the Pac12 against BYU, an independent — both former Mountain West Schools.

The New Mexico Lobos twice have played in the Las Vegas Bowl, losing to 27-13 to UCLA in 2002 (a game noteworthy for Katie Hnida’s historic appearance as a kicker for UNM) and 55-14 to Oregon State the following year.

MWC schools have a New Mexico Bowl record of 12-6 since the league’s inception.