Could the Mountain West Become a BCS Conference?

If this college football season has taught us anything, it's that the Mountain West Conference is not only the best non-BCS conference but that its teams are, overall, better than those in the Big East, ACC, and Pac-10.

There are 10 BCS bowl slots that give the participating teams millions of dollars and better recruiting opportunities. It's no wonder that the six auto-qualifying conferences, each hoping to have multiple teams in BCS bowls, have no interest in making it easier for non-BCS teams to play in a BCS bowl game.

Currently, the Mountain West has nine teams:

1. Air Force
2. BYU
3. Colorado State
4. New Mexico
5. San Diego State
6. TCU
7. UNLV
8. Utah
9. Wyoming

If the Mountain West were to add three more teams—Boise State, Fresno State, and Tulsa—there would be no way it could be denied an automatic berth to a BCS bowl.*

• Boise State is an easy argument to make: The Broncos won a junior college national championship, a Division I-AA national championship, won the Fiesta Bowl just 10 years after joining Division I-A, and they have more wins than any other team since 2000.

• Fresno State is a weird team. They lose to weak WAC teams (La. Tech, Utah State), but when they play BCS conference teams, they play hard and often win (or barely lose). They are, however, respected by voters since they tend to get ranked easily (even in preseason polls).

• Tulsa would not bring as much to the conference as Boise State and Fresno State, but they are a strong team with a lot of potential.

As with other 12-team conferences, the conference would be divided into two regions (probably East and West). This would allow for a conference championship game that would replace the current "shared title" format, with an undisputed winner.

Let's say the MWC had already added these three teams before this season started. It would have four teams in the top 15 (Week 10 BCS rankings) which is as many as the SEC and Pac-10 combined. It would have had six teams that made an appearance in the top 25 this season and two of the only three non-BCS teams to bust the BCS.

*College football is a multi-billion dollar industry. Regardless of the fact that these are not professional athletes, the industry itself is very much about making money off of them. Denying a qualifying/deserving conference the money-making opportunities granted to BCS conferences would most certainly turn into a lawsuit that I'm confident they'd win.