Joe Santoro: Can any MW team reach the playoff?

The chance of any team in the Mountain West being selected for this year's 12-team College Football Playoff could end within the first five weeks of the season.

A Mountain West team will likely have to suffer no more than one loss all season to earn a spot in the playoffs this December. That means that no team in the Mountain West can afford to fall flat on their face during the non-conference portion of their schedule.

Which Mountain West team has the best path in its non-conference schedule during the first month of the season to remain in the hunt for the college football playoff? Keep in mind that simply going undefeated in non-conference games could be meaningless if it is against FCS and Group of Five teams. A Mountain West team will have to prove it belongs with the best teams in the Power Four (Big 10, SEC, ACC, Big 12) to get noticed by the playoff selection committee.

Fresno State can make a loud statement if it beats Michigan on Aug. 31. Boise State can do the same at Oregon on Sept. 7. San Diego State meets Oregon State on Sept, 7 and Cal the following week. UNLV can open eyes against Houston (Aug. 31), Kansas (Sept. 13) and Syracuse (Oct. 4). Colorado State can become a contender if it beats Texas (Aug. 31), Colorado (Sept. 14) and Oregon State (Oct. 5). Utah State gets big tests against USC (Sept. 7) and Utah (Sept. 14). Even Nevada can usher in the Jeff Choate era with a bang by beating SMU (Aug. 24) and Minnesota (Sept. 14).

The carrot that is the 12-team College Football Playoff has given much more meaning and importance to Mountain West teams playing and beating Power Four schools in September and early October. It's not just about playing rich teams solely for a nice paycheck anymore.

We will have a pretty good idea by the first week of October whether any Mountain West team will be in serious consideration for the 12-team CFP party in late December.

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The Wolf Pack, if you can believe the oddsmakers, will likely see their playoff chances go up in smoke in roughly three weeks when they play SMU. SMU, which went 11-3 last season, is currently a 24-point favorite for its matchup at Nevada on Aug. 24.

The Mustangs, which will be playing in the ACC this season for the first time (moving from the American Athletic Conference), are led by talented quarterback Preston Stone, who passed for 3,197 yards and 28 touchdowns last year. The last message SMU wants to send to its new ACC family is a loss to Nevada to start the season.

The Wolf Pack, though, which has lost 21 of its last 25 games since head coach Jay Norvell left for Colorado State after the 2021 regular season, has much more on the line this season than worrying about making the College Football Playoff. The Pack, first and foremost, needs to build a foundation for the Jeff Choate era. Choate the Throat talks a good game but he needs to give the Pack something tangible and real this year and not just empty cliches from his introductory press conference.

Five or six wins should do it. Heck, even four would be an improvement. But two wins, which was all former coach Ken Wilson could muster in either of his two seasons, is not acceptable. That's not a foundation. That's a flooded hole that the Pack simply cannot escape.

Choate, before he starts thinking about things like playoffs and championships, has to stop the bleeding. He's the fifth Pack coach since 2012, following Chris Ault, Brian Polian, Norvell and Wilson. The Pack has become a turnstile program for coaches, a revolving door that never stops spinning. It's nothing new. It's been that way ever since the Pack made the jump to Division I-A in 1992.

The Pack changed coaches five times in its first dozen years in college football's top level, going from Ault to Jeff Horton to Ault again to Jeff Tisdel to Chris Tormey and, yes, back to Ault once more after the 2003 season. It was a Chris and Jeff whirlwind that left the Pack dizzy.

The Pack is still dizzy. The Division II and I-AA days, when Ault led the program from 1976 through 1991, now seem like centuries ago, a fairytale that never really happened. And, you can be sure, those days will never happen again.

Choate has to stop the spinning and the dizziness. Nobody expects the 54-year-old Choate the Throat to coach the Pack until he is at least 70 years old. Heck, Ault didn't even do that. But Choate does need to give this program stability, focus, leadership, direction and a plan. He needs to instill toughness and a standard that never wavers.

You know, all the things Ault did. And you can't do that in three or four years. All you can do as a head coach in three or four years is get yourself fired or get another job. Neither one helps the Pack in the long run and stops the spinning.

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Who is the best quarterback in the Mountain West right now? That honor belongs to either Fresno State's Mikey Keene, Colorado State's Brayden Fowler-Nicolosi and Hawaii's Brayden Schager. Those three, without question, are the most experienced and accomplished quarterbacks in the league to start the season.

Keene, who played two seasons at Central Florida (2021, 22), passed for 2,976 yards and 24 touchdowns last year at Fresno State. Schager has played the last three years at Hawaii, throwing for 6,505 yards and 41 touchdowns in 31 games. He led the conference last year with 3,542 yards and 26 touchdowns. Fowler-Nicolosi, who was among the recruits Norvell stole from the Pack, threw for 3,460 yards and 22 touchdowns last year.

All will likely improve on their numbers this year. Keene has big-time athletes around him at Fresno State, Fowler-Nicolosi plays in the pass-happy Air Raid and Schager is in the quarterback-friendly Run-and-Shoot. Building fake and gaudy numbers is the strength of the Air Raid and Run and Shoot.

Who could threaten the Big Three for quarterback supremacy in the Mountain West this year? Boise State has USC transfer Malachi Nelson (one career completion), UNLV has Holy Cross transfer Matt Sluka, a two-time Walter Payton Award (the Division I-AA Heisman) finalist and everyone else (including the Wolf Pack) has a sample platter of quarterbacks and is hoping one stands out above the rest.

The Wolf Pack decision seems to be coming down to Brendan Lewis and Chubba Purdy. Lewis passed for 1,313 yards and all of two touchdowns last year in a dozen games. He also had 1,727 yards and 10 touchdowns in three years at Colorado. Purdy has thrown for 846 yards and six touchdowns in bits of four years at Florida State and Nebraska.

The experience and maturity Lewis and Purdy offer is intriguing and promising. They also now get to work with new offensive coordinator Matt Lubick and quarterback coach David Gilbertson. The Pack should see a vast improvement in its quarterback play this season no matter who takes the bulk of the snaps.

Choate has said he wants his quarterbacks, more than anything else, to show leadership on and off the field, to throw the ball accurately and to take care of the ball. Notice he didn't mention decision-making as one of his top three requirements. Choate, Lubick and Gilbertson, apparently, will make the decisions.

Lewis, who completed just 55.5 percent of his passes and had issues holding onto the ball when he decided to run, would seem to be lacking in two of the three requirements. But Purdy has completed just 52.1 percent of his career passes and has more interceptions (seven) than touchdown passes (six) in his career.

It seems like a dead heat right now for the Pack starting quarterback job.

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It is still a bit confusing as to why Purdy left San Jose State in the blink of an eye last season for Nevada. He supposedly transferred from Nebraska to San Jose State after last year to be closer to his brother Brock in San Francisco and also get a legitimate chance at a starting job.

But when San Jose State coach Brent Brennan left for Arizona (Purdy's home state, by the way), Chubba jumped back in the portal and ended up in Nevada.

Did San Jose move away from the Bay area? Did the Spartans tell Chubba that he wouldn't be able to compete for a starting job? Did Choate whisper in his ear that the Pack starting job was his for the taking? Why didn't Chubba just go to Arizona (his home state, by the way) with Brennan?

None of it really makes sense. But that is the world we live in now, a ridiculous transfer portal party where players can change their mind from one moment to the next.

Pack fans, of course, shouldn't question it all that much. It is certainly a good thing that Purdy has increased the competition in the quarterback room. And if Purdy wins the job and throws for 3,000-plus yards and two dozen touchdowns, it will all make perfect sense.

But what if Purdy is on the bench? What if he then looks up and wonders just what the heck he was doing in Nevada in the first place? What if the evil portal starts calling his name again? That can happen if he has a bad or good year.

It's hard for college football fans to have much faith in anything these days. Nothing means what it used to mean. It's a players' and coaches' world now and we just buy the tickets and donate the money.

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The biggest issue facing the Mountain West this season is what, exactly, will it do with Oregon State and Washington State. The two Pac-12 leftovers, it seems, aren't exactly rushing into the Mountain West's arms.

How goofy is the Pac-2? Well, the two schools had the nerve to conduct a media day recently in Las Vegas at the Bellagio where they served cocktails at an open bar. They called it "After Hours With the Beavs and Cougs."

Classy, huh?

"We are drinking tonight," Pac-2 commissioner Teresa Gould said. "If anyone has earned the right to drink, it's the Pac-12."

The fact that she still says "Pac-12" proves how out of touch with reality she has become.

Oregon State and Washington State have just two seasons to make a decision. The NCAA, for some reason, doesn't like two-team conferences. Go figure. The Beavs and Cougs can either become independents, join another conference or entice other teams to join their after-hours cocktail parties. Anything is possible in these greedy, selfish days of college sports.

It doesn't, however, seem likely Oregon State and Washington State, which will each play seven (Oregon State) or eight (Washington State) games this season against Mountain West teams, want to join the Mountain West on a full-time basis. The Mountain West is beneath them. The Mountain West, of course, is where they belong. But the Beavs and Cougs are just waiting to see if a better offer comes along.

Playing the Beavs and Cougs is all well and good for this year. But the Mountain West cannot continue to prop up the two cocktail party teams every year. There's a reason, after all, nobody wanted Oregon State and Washington State last year. The sooner Oregon State and Washington State accept that reality, the better off everyone will be.

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The new Wolf Pack men's basketball arena still looks like a parking lot at the Grand Sierra Resort. But the folks in charge of the proposed arena this week said they will starting digging up that parking lot next spring with the hope that the Pack will be playing basketball in its new home in the 2027-28 season.

It's all very exciting. New is always exciting in the social media, trending world we now live in. Just ask the Democratic Party. But can the Wolf Pack truly handle this move long term? Is leaving a convenient on-campus home to go live in a casino in the middle of two highways really the best thing for the Pack?

Well, it will be great for the first few years. And it will be great as long as the Wolf Pack puts forth an exciting and winning program. But will Pack fans head to that casino arena to pay higher ticket, parking and concession prices to watch, say, a 10-win team in February? Will students get in their car or hire Uber to go to that casino to watch a boring team that has no chance to get to the NCAA Tournament? They barely walk across an half-empty parking lot now when that happens.

The new arena will put tremendous pressure on Nevada to produce a winning, meaningful, exciting product on the floor each and every season. There will be pressure to make sure Steve Alford is followed on the Pack bench by another high-priced coach with a big name and even bigger resume.

The Pack will be stepping into a highly competitive world it has never truly lived in before.