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With a few new friends joining an already-enigmatic bunch, this is gearing up to be a very Mountain West-like season. Seven of the conference’s 12 teams will be showcasing a first-year head coach, one of which is returning to the Mountain West coach and two of which still have an interim tag attached. Of those two, one is the youngest coach in the FBS and the other took the job so recently that it was his predecessor at Mountain West Media Days. To add to the strangeness and excitement, the 12-team playoff has arrived, providing a clear and defined path to the College Football Playoff. This has given the Mountain West a real opportunity and the stakes have never been higher. If things fall into place just right, the Mountain West championship could mean a chance to play in the College Football Playoff.
The Mountain West is a tough league but until proven otherwise, it will appear to be a race to play, or replace, Boise State in the title match. The Broncos will have to ward off some formidable suitors. Fresno State, UNLV, and Wyoming will be gunning for a top spot. At the bottom, a trio of Nevada, New Mexico, and San Jose State will be looking to find their footing with the rest of the pack fitting somewhere in between.
Before we take a look at the conference, let’s take a look at the friends of the Mountain West. This year the Mountain West will have some visitors from the Pac-12. Oregon State and Washington State have both taken a beating on and off the field. Left behind as the only remaining members of their conference the two teams couldn’t even field a schedule. The two teams entered into a scheduling agreement with the Mountain West, so even though they won’t be eligible for the title game, they will be playing a Mountain West schedule.
Washington State
Jake Dickert’s Washington State didn’t get the kindest draw in the Mountain West slate and doesn’t have the easiest non-conference schedule either.
The Cougars open with Portland State, Texas Tech, Washington, San Jose State, and Boise State before their first bye. Portland and San Jose State represent winnable games, but the other three will be tough and they could pretty easily be 2-3 to open the season.
Coming out of the bye they will be met with a tough game against Fresno State, at which point the season could be at a pretty dangerous juncture. After what could easily be a 2-4 start, the Cougars would have to win at least four of their last six games against Hawaii, San Diego State, Utah State, New Mexico, Oregon State, and Wyoming. It’s possible, but the path to six wins is a rocky one for Washington State this year. Wazzu should end up between 3-9 and 8-4.
Oregon State
Oregon State is in slightly better shape and gets a slightly better draw. Like most of the Mountain West teams, the Beavers will be led by a first-year head coach in Trent Brady, who has been coaching defense within the program in some capacity since 2018. He was previously the defensive coordinator and linebackers coach.
The schedule for the Beavers is broken up into three four-game pods broken up by bye weeks. Their first set includes Idaho State, San Diego State, Oregon, and Purdue. Oregon State should take care of the Mountain West portion of that schedule but will have a harder time against the Big Ten portion.
After a bye, Oregon State will face Colorado State, Nevada, UNLV, and Cal. The Nevada schools stand out in this section of the schedule. The toughest team in this stretch is UNLV while the Wolf Pack will be in a rebuild.
The final stretch starts with a game against another rebuilding team in San Jose State. Then the Beavers play at Air Force and host Washington State. Then the Beavers close their season on the road against Boise State. The Broncos won’t go down easy, but if the Beavers can survive against Air Force, the Beavers should best the Cougars, and a winning season should be in play even if they drop their season finale. Oregon State could land anywhere from 3-9 (though that seems like it would be a long shot) and 9-3. A record closer to 7-5 seems more reasonable.
Air Force Falcons
Air Force is Air Force, and that’s just about all there is to it. Troy Calhoun, the longest-tenured coach in the Mountain West by a large margin, has amassed a record of 130-82. In his 18 years, his Falcons have only missed a bowl game five times. In the 13 bowl games they have gone to, they are 8-5. That’s probably indicative of what’s to come.
The Falcons have plenty of holes to fill with a slew of departures headlined by quarterback Zac Larrier, but in Colorado Springs, it’s just rinse and repeat. The Falcons are coming off three consecutive bowl games and have won ten, ten, and nine games in the past three seasons. So, even with the substantial losses to the roster, anyone who has been watching Air Force for the past decade knows better than to count them out.
The Falcons open conference play early and will host San Jose State in week two. Their week three matchup on the road against Baylor should be interesting. After that, they get a bye week and proceed with a pretty standard Air Force schedule with games against the rest of the Mountain West, Navy, and Army. They avoid Boise State, but travel to Laramie and host the Bulldogs. Air Force could go 4-8 on the low end or 9-3 on the high end.
Boise State Broncos
As much as the other 11 teams — and their fan bases — hate to admit it, Mountain West football runs through Boise. This year looks like it won’t be different.
Much could be said about the dramatics of last season and the unlikely rise of an untested coach in Spencer Danielson, but none of that would discredit what is happening at Boise State. In fact, much could be said of the entire program, but not much discourse is necessary to sum up what the Broncos have. That’s all because of one Ashton Jeanty.
Jeanty is, without question, one of the most impressive ball carriers in the nation. He’s the best running back in the conference and one of the most dangerous offensive players. In a lackluster program, he can single handedly make up for deficiencies around him, be it insufficient help on offense or poor coaching. In a competent program, he can elevate the team from good to great and from great to titanic. The Broncos could have done anything this offseason and it wouldn’t matter one bit. As long as Jeanty is in a Bronco uniform, Boise State will be a contender. Boise State should expect to go between 9-3 and 11-1.
Colorado State Rams
Colorado State is going into year three of the Jay Norvell experiment and it hasn’t gone as well as the Rams would have hoped when they poached the offensive tactician from Nevada. All the Rams have really managed to do so far is sabotage their conference foe on the way to mediocrity (Nevada has gone 2-20 while Colorado State has gone 8-16 since then). The Rams hope that will change this season.
The Rams haven’t seen a bowl game since 2017, when they capped off a five-year run of bowl appearances, but got just about as close as possible last year. They got within a game of bowl eligibility last season and came up just short of adding that last win multiple times, including a 43-35 overtime loss at Colorado, a 25-23 loss at UNLV, a 24-15 loss at Wyoming, and a 27-24 loss at Hawaii.
As is standard with Norvell’s teams, the story here will be the offense. Norvell likes to throw the ball around and he has a team that should be able to pass to his liking. Brayden Fowler-Nicolosi showed flashes of being a really high-level quarterback last year and Tory Horton is one of the best wide receivers in the conference. Horton was All-Mountain First team last season and Fowler-Nicolosi earned an honorable mention. Horton was also named to the Preseason All-Conference team this year.
Overall, the Rams should be able to take a step forward this year. If everything clicks, Norvell, Fowler-Nicolosi, and Horton could create a solid, if not dangerous, offense. The defense, led by linebacker Chase Wilson, should at least be able to keep up.
An adept defense and a Jay Norvell offense would certainly do the trick in Fort Collins, but only time will tell if the Rams will hit those marks. Colorado State should finish within 4-8 and 8-4.