MW bowl possibilities The Mountain West have five guaranteed spots, with the possibility of more. Here’s a look at who could end up where. Las Vegas Bowl — More often that not, the game takes the champion, and the Mountain West prefers its best team to face a foe from the Pac-12. Boise State will be favored to beat Fresno State this week and the next week in the MW Championship. The Broncos are a longshot to reach the New Year’s 6, so the Broncos likely land here. New Mexico Bowl — A matchup with Conference USA. Utah State, Colorado State and Wyoming have all been there in the past six seasons, San Diego State and former UNM coach Rocky Long have not, nor has Fresno State, so this could be a good landing spot for the Bulldogs. Potato Bowl — The opponent is from the MAC, and Ohio, Northern Illinois or Toledo would present a challenge. CSU was there last year, Utah State and SDSU in the past five years. Wyoming has not played in the game and could be headed north. Hawaii Bowl — This game gives the MW a chance to play an AAC team, and SDSU has taken down two in the past two bowl years. CSU played there this year, but has not been to the bowl. SDSU, Fresno State and Boise State have. Don’t be shocked if the Aztecs are sent to take down another AAC team. Or Fresno State. Arizona Bowl — The Sun Belt provides the opponent, and outside of Troy, the league is down. Of the bowl-eligible teams, only CSU has played there prior. Utah State could land this spot. Cactus Bowl — Would have second choice after Vegas, but only if the Pac-12 or Big 12 can’t fill a slot. Both will. Foster Farms Bowl — Would come into play if the Pac-12 or Big 10 can’t fill a spot. Not likely to be the case. Frisco Bowl — The AAC is locked in, leaving the MW to battle the Sun Belt and CUSA for the other spot. CSU could provide a nice matchup here.

FORT COLLINS — The conversations started a month ago, and each week, they seem to begin from scratch again.

Welcome to the ever-changing bowl outlook for the Mountain West.

“As often is the case in this bowl landscape, there’s not a lot of hard and fast, this team is going there, this team is going there,” MW deputy commissioner Bret Gilliland said. “It’s who’s the pool, who’s in the mix and how do we get them placed?”

The thought process held at the beginning of last week came crashing down in a hurry, as 11 more teams became bowl-eligible, some of them unexpected. That brought the number of bowl-eligible teams to 70 and there are only 78 spots available.

Four more are guaranteed to join the mix this weekend. The Pac-12 has a pair of 5-6 matchups (Colorado vs. Utah and Cal vs. UCLA), with one each in the Big 10 (Purdue-Indiana) and Conference USA (Middle Tennesse-Old Dominion). That leaves 11 more five-win teams playing games, one of them UNLV, facing rival Nevada.

If UNLV wins, that gives the Mountain West seven bowl-eligible teams and only five guaranteed tie-ins. So for the past month, Gilliland and the conference have tried to stay ahead of the game, but it’s nearly impossible.

“You want to play all the scenarios out, but you don’t want to get too wrapped up in the axel because there’s still two weeks left,” he said.

All the questions will be answered the afternoon of Dec. 3, but until then, all sorts of combinations are being considered.

The conference has no real pecking order when it comes to the bowl games it holds affiliations. The Las Vegas Bowl picks first, but it doesn’t have to take the champion. The league can then turn to the Cactus Bowl if there’s an opening, but even Gilliland said that is unlikely this year. There is an agreement with the Foster Farms game, which also looks like a longshot.

The trio of the New Mexico Bowl, Famous Idaho Potato Bowl and Hawaii Bowl are all even, and then comes the Arizona Bowl. Recently, the league has built a relationship with the Frisco Bowl, where an American Athletic Conference team will face an opponent from the MW, the MAC or CUSA.

But how do they pick and who do the bowls like?

Gilliland said they invited four of their bowl partners to the MW command center on Saturday, then took them to an Air Force game. That day gave them a chance to exchange ideas and express what they favor, and the schools have provided input, too. It’s no secret CSU would like to avoid the Hawaii Bowl (having already made the trip this year) and the Potato Bowl (played there last year).

In the end, it may not matter. Who matters most may be Pete Derzis, the senior vice president of college sports programing and events at ESPN. The network owns 13 bowl games (and televises multiple others), five of those affecting the Mountain West.

What ESPN is looking for, naturally, is intriguing games and story lines.

“I think we have some influence. At the end of the day, this is no secret, ESPN owns 13 bowls. Peter Derzis out of Charlotte has a lot of influence on a lot of those games, and they televise a vast majority of the others,” Gilliland said. “They can be deal makers in that space. We’ve got two arrangements where we’re scheduled to play the American — Hawaii, and if we were able to land in Frisco. There’s an opportunity there for some good matchups.”

A good game will trump all other rules. Players the caliber of Colorado State’s Michael Gallup (a Biletnikoff finalist) and SDSU’s Rashaad Penny (the leading rusher in the nation), pique the interest of bowl directors.

Gilliland admitted the league doesn’t like to send a team to a bowl game two years in a row if it can help it, or send a team to Hawaii if they played there in the regular season.

Bowl games like new teams, but they also like old friends who travel well.

“I know it sounds like evasiveness, but it really is this gumbo,” Gilliland said. “It’s one factor, but it’s not the end-all, be-all, because there are three other things in the equation where we have to put somebody else somewhere, and that means who we might like to put in Hawaii needs to go someplace else. In these last couple of weeks, we maybe have some opportunities present themselves.”

With six teams and only five guarantees, if the Frisco Bowl has its eye on the possibility of a 10-win San Diego State, the conference might be moved to send the Aztecs there to guarantee they get at least six teams in postseason games.

And watch for trades to create matchups. That’s why San Diego State played Houston in Las Vegas last year, why CSU faced Idaho in Boise.

If the Rebels join the fray, Gilliland’s work to get all of the conference teams into games becomes more difficult and with no guarantees. In each of the past two years, there have been three five-win teams picked for bowl games, but there is also one fewer bowl in 2017, the loss of the Poinsettia Bowl directly affecting the MW.

The NCAA won’t accept a five-win team before all eligible teams are placed, and the Mountain West won’t leave a seven-win team home over a six-win program.

There are still two years remaining on the bowl moratorium set by the NCAA, and while Gilliland said the conference hasn’t been active in trying to create bowl games, they have kept in touch with people who are discussing creating more of them. As of now, few of those discussions are out west, with most of the bowl games out east.

At the end of the 2019 bowl season, contracts end, and Gilliland said discussions are ongoing with current bowl partners, as well as seeing if there is interest from other games.

“Once we get through this bowl season, I think you’ll see some stuff come out in terms of here’s how the process is going to work, here’s how bowls get certified, here’s how many bowls each conference will be able to make primary agreements with, based upon average number of bowl eligible teams,” he said. “We have already started conversations with our existing partners and keeping our fingers on the pulse of who else could be out there that potentially cold be looking to add a game and whether or not it makes sense for us.”

Mike Brohard: 970-635-3633, mbrohard@reporter-herald.com or twitter.com/mbrohard