The Front Row with MARK NELKE September 30, 2010

So the WAC is considering inviting some combination of Texas State, Texas-San Antonio, Seattle U and Denver U in the next month or two to join its league, probably in 2012.

The prospect of the Idaho Vandals playing Seattle U on a regular basis is intriguing, and playing Denver U is somewhat intriguing.

The Texas Two-Step schools - not so much.

What, is the Sun Belt not hiring?

And Seattle and Denver don't play football, which is what this expansion business is all about anyway.

The four above-mentioned schools made presentations to the WAC membership committee in Dallas earlier this week. Montana was also there, but on more of a "fact finding mission," according to their people.

Adding Montana and Montana State and some of the other Big Sky Conference schools would at least create more buzz to Vandal fans than adding the Texas Two-Step schools. But the Big Sky schools would have to be willing to step up from the coziness of the Football Championship Subdivision level of football.

At this point, the WAC merging with the Mountain West Conference probably makes more sense. The MWC seems to think it's good enough to join forces with some other marginal conference in an effort to earn an automatic berth in the BCS.

But two of the best three teams in the MWC (Utah and BYU) leaving the conference at the end of this season significantly weakens that league.

Boise State will be one of the top two football teams in the Mountain West the minute it joins the conference next summer, and the other top team (TCU) is either looking at other conferences, or reportedly being pursued by other conferences.

After that, it's Wyoming, Air Force, New Mexico, UNLV, San Diego State and Colorado State in the Mountain West, as well as Nevada and Fresno State, who are also leaving the WAC.

That leaves the WAC with Idaho, Utah State, Louisiana Tech, New Mexico State, San Jose State, Hawaii and whoever else they can recruit.

If the WAC adds the not-so-fearsome foursome mentioned above, the league would have eight teams for football - meaning seven league games for everybody - and 10 teams for basketball - meaning everyone has a travel partner and a normal two-games-per-weekend schedule. That would be better than the setup in the current nine-team WAC, where there is no rhyme or reason to the basketball schedule.

Last year in conference play, the Vandal men's basketball team played three games on Monday, three on Wednesday, twice on Thursday and eight times on Saturday. In one stretch, the Vandals had a week between games, then played four games in eight days.

So in that respect, adding those teams makes sense. But that's about it.

Mark Nelke is sports editor of the press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via e-mail at mnelke@cdapress.com.