Conference realignment chaos continued when UTEP joined the Mountain West yesterday. The Miners finally join fellow members of the "old guard" of the WAC, Wyoming, Air Force, New Mexico, and Hawaii while joining other familiar faces UNLV and Nevada in their new home. Like Air Force's move to stay in the conference, UTEP's move impacts bowl season.
The Arizona Bowl in Tucson is one of the few exclusively Group of Five bowls not owned by ESPN, with tie-ins with the Mountain West and MAC. This means the bowl does not undergo any "under-the-table" deals involving the Group of Five that ESPN conducts with the many bowls they own. Thus, pending extreme circumstances, a Mountain West team will play a MAC team in the Arizona Bowl each year.
UTEP immediately becomes the closest Mountain West school to Tucson, 318 miles away from the southern Arizona city. UNLV is the next closest remaining post-2026 Mountain West member at 411 miles from Tucson. UTEP is immediately the most attractive Mountain West team for the Arizona Bowl, besides Air Force which has a national following, and Luke Air Force Base near Tucson.
The Arizona Bowl likely agreed to a tie-in with Conference USA in its inaugural season in 2015 with the intent of inviting the Miners. Unfortunately, this never came to fruition after the conference did not provide enough bowl-eligible teams, none of which were UTEP, and instead opted for a Sun Belt tie-in in 2016.
An Arizona Bowl selection would be a welcome change of pace for UTEP fans. 2005 was the last time UTEP played in a bowl other than the New Mexico Bowl when they appeared in the GMAC Bowl in Mobile. UTEP reaches bowl eligibility with enough infrequency that the New Mexico Bowl picks them every time they reach bowl eligibility.
The Arizona Bowl is an easy and new experience for Miners fans. Furthermore, UTEP has zero appearances in bowls located in Arizona, despite the WAC having ties to the Fiesta Bowl from 1971-1977 and the Guaranteed Rate Bowl from 1990-1997.
Not only does the Arizona Bowl gain a nearby school, UTEP's presence frees them from a future conflict with the New Mexico Bowl. In 2015 and 2016, the Arizona Bowl had to compete with the New Mexico Bowl for the bowl-eligible Lobos. Now, both bowls can work out a mutually beneficial outcome if both schools are eligible.
People often focus on the impacts conference realignment has on the schools. However, bowl games sometimes feel the effects. One of college football's most overlooked bowls arguably walked out as one of the biggest winners of the Mountain West/PAC-? conflict.
