Mountain West is a One Team League

First, I am not saying that the Mountain West only deserves one team in the Big Dance. However, I am saying that when betting or filling out your bracket, maybe stop and think before you pick a Mountain West team that isn’t named San Diego State.

The Mountain West is a phenomenal basketball conference that has produced elite NBA talent like Kawhi Leonard, the Martin brothers, and Derrick Jones. The games are also extremely exciting, especially the conference tournament, where upsets routinely happen. This year, it looks like three teams will make the tournament led by New Mexico, Utah State, and San Diego State. I also think they will sneak one more in—either Boise State or Colorado State—making the MW a four-bid league.

New Mexico is a fun watch, specifically because of Donovan Dent, an electric guard and dominant scorer. Even though SDSU has not been great in conference play, with New Mexico and Utah State beating them, they are still the only team I will bet on to go far, and that has to do with their style. SDSU is a shut-down defensive team. They completely take the life out of power conference offenses, as we saw during their run to the National Championship in 2023. They struggle at times in conference play because teams have more time to watch film and anticipate their defensive style. However, in a tournament setting, the quick turnarounds benefit SDSU. Other MW teams like New Mexico and Utah State try to outscore teams, which does not work, especially against power conference schools. I think this style, particularly among small-conference sympathizers, is why some people swear the MW is better than certain power conferences like the ACC or even the Big East. However, when looking at the stats, it’s pretty easy to say that the MW is the most overrated conference in college basketball.

To start, the Mountain West does not have a team with a winning record in the NCAA tournament. SDSU is exactly .500, while the next two teams with the most wins are BYU and Utah—neither of which are in the MW anymore. If you take away those three teams, the current MW teams have a combined record of 11-38 in tournament games, a horrific win percentage of just 29%.

Historically, UNLV has been the best team besides SDSU, but most of their dominance came before the MW. Since joining, they haven’t made a tournament game since 2013. Again, I don’t blame the MW itself—I blame the Twitter and analytics nerds who swear they’d rather see four or five MW teams in the tournament instead of a power conference team.

Last year, New Mexico was a bid stealer, winning the MW tournament, and all over TikTok and Twitter, people like Ryan Hammer swore they would make a tournament run. They were a popular upset pick as a 12-seed against 5-seed Clemson, who was supposedly "overrated" because the ACC was considered weak. Well, it turns out New Mexico wasn’t very good—they got boat-raced and lost by 20 in a game where they had no shot.

Boise State is another team that analytics and Twitter nerds love when they make the tournament, but since joining the MW, they are 0-5 in tournament games. Then there’s Colorado State, which set the sport of basketball back in last year’s tournament with their lack of offense. They scored just 67 points to win their play-in game against Virginia, who was awful, and as a 10-seed, many thought they could beat Texas. Guess what? They didn’t, scoring only 44 points.

Finally, there’s Utah State. I’ll give them credit for beating TCU in the first round last year, but they then lost by 39 to Purdue in the Round of 32. I liked them under head coach Danny Sprinkle because they played a strong defensive style. However, he left for a power conference job. This year, Utah State will likely make the tournament, but they now play with an offense-first approach and rank 147th in defensive rating—below teams like Providence and Rutgers. That’s not very good, and while maybe they can outscore power conference offenses, based on MW history, I highly doubt it.

Maybe this year, the MW will prove me wrong and make the tournament jump that the public thinks they will. However, until that happens, I will be picking against MW teams not named San Diego State.