SAN DIEGO — June gloom has cleared up across the region, but San Diego State’s conference future remains cloudy after an exchange of letters this week between the university and the Mountain West about its potential exit.
Multiple conference sources confirmed SDSU President Adela de la Torre sent a letter to Mountain West Commissioner Gloria Nevarez and all 11 other presidents on Tuesday indicating the university’s “intention” to leave in the 2024-25 academic year, presumably for the Pac-12 or Big 12, but exploring flexibility in their departure deadline and exit fees.
The conference replied that it interpreted the letter as notification of SDSU’s departure and initiated the separation procedure, which includes withholding the school’s roughly $6 million payout for 2022-23 due in early July and removing de la Torre from the conference’s board of directors.
De la Torre hastily wrote back disputing the semantics, the sources said, insisting this was not a formal notification of departure but a request about negotiating terms to help SDSU make an informed decision if or when an invitation from a power conference comes this summer.
The Mountain West’s bylaws are clear on departure terms. The exit fee is three times the average annual payout per school, or about $17 million, if you provide one-year notice by June 30. After that, the fee doubles to approximately $34 million.
SDSU’s letters, the sources said, asked about a one month extension and whether the exit fee could be paid in installments over several years. The bylaws call for the conference to withhold the annual payouts this year as well as next year, SDSU’s final in the Mountain West, then collect balance when the Aztecs begin in a new conference.
The Mountain West declined comment and referred media to SDSU.
Athletic Director John David Wicker would not confirm the content or even existence of the letters, saying only: “We’re doing our due diligence. Obviously there are a lot of discussions about potential opportunities available to us, and June 30 is coming up quickly. We’re just trying to understand what our options are.”
Asked if they are any closer to an invitation from a power conference, Wicker added: “No, I would not say that.”
Asked whether SDSU would withdraw from the Mountain West if the deadline were today, Wicker said: “I don’t know the answer to that.”
ESPN first reported about de la Torre’s initial letter, citing a source.
“They’re trying to find out what we’re willing to do,” the source told ESPN. “They want to see if the Mountain West Conference is going to handle this nicely. Well, that’s not going to happen. Everyone wants to find the best financial path for themselves, and it’s clunky.”
The conference’s board minus de la Torre is expected to meet to discuss the status of SDSU and its request for leniency with the deadline and exit fee.
The June 30 date never figured to be an issue when news broke last summer that USC and UCLA would leave the Pac-12 for the Big Ten in 2024-25, and speculation immediately turned to SDSU as the leading replacement candidate. But the Pac-12, whose media rights deal expires next year, first needs to finalize a new one, and negotiations have dragged on through the fall, winter and spring.
The latest reports project it to going into the summer.
“This is going to be a tight deadline,” de la Torre told the Union-Tribune last month, “there’s no question about it.”
She also said: “I’m really confident about our future in a Power 5 conference. ... I’m patient. I’m one of these very patient leaders. There are a lot of people who want to rush. I have a good relationship with a number of the presidents in the Pac-12. I know we’re the No. 1 (expansion candidate), that they believe in us, that they see their future with us. I’m optimistic. But there’s never a straight line to success.”
Even if the Pac-12 invites SDSU, there’s the question of who’s left in the conference. Colorado and Arizona reportedly have held conversations about jumping to the Big 12, and Oregon and Washington are said to prefer joining USC and UCLA in the Big Ten. Arizona State and Utah also have been mentioned as Big 12 expansion candidates.
Should SDSU leave, the Mountain West could face a renegotiation of its contract with television partners CBS and Fox Sports without the conference’s marquee member — and face that in a depressed economy for media rights deals. Numerous regional sports networks have filed for bankruptcy this year, and the Pac-12 has struggled to find lucrative TV partners.
Nevarez, the Mountain West commissioner, was unavailable for comment Thursday.
Last month, when asked about flexibility of the conference’s exit bylaws, she said: “Certainly if (SDSU has) a request, our board would review it. I wouldn’t suppose how they would react to it. Like any buyout clause in a coach’s contract or an employee’s contract, it’s intended to make sure we don’t take a step back, that we either make ourselves whole or invest it in expansion. All those factors need to be considered.”
