OLYMPIA, Wash. — Two representatives from Washington State University spoke to lawmakers this week about how recent conference realignment has left the school's athletic department in an "unprecedented" situation.
During a Senate Higher Education and Workforce Development work session, WSU's deputy director of athletics and director of state relations explained the fallout from the wave of moves by schools in the Pacific-12 Conference, which left WSU and Oregon State University as the lone remaining schools in the league.
The first moves came in the summer of 2022, when the University of California, Los Angeles and the University of Southern California announced they were joining the Big Ten Conference. In July 2023, the University of Colorado announced it was returning to the Big 12 Conference and also leaving the Pac-12. The remaining nine members were presented with an Apple TV media rights deal that would have required subscription thresholds, meaning the conference members would earn more money from the deal if more people signed up for the Pac-12 package.
Three days after that presentation, five schools, including the University of Washington, announced they too were departing from the conference.
"WSU didn't ask for this fate and frankly we don't deserve it," said Chris Mulick, WSU's state relations director on Tuesday.
With an uncertain future, Mulick and Deputy Athletic Director Brad Corbin detailed how WSU has adjusted its short-term scheduling for most sports. The football team will play six Mountain West Conference (MWC) teams through a scheduling agreement, and most of the other sports will compete in the West Coast Conference (WCC).
A significant decline in revenue is expected, however, as the school continues to consider options for a media rights deal for football. Both WSU and UW were consistently getting significantly less revenue from the conference and NCAA payouts in recent years than expected, per slides shared during the presentation.
All this comes as inner turmoil appears to surface on the academic side of WSU as well. Three faculty members are calling for "an immediate change" in leadership, claiming the stature of the school is in decline.
In a press release, Dr. Michael Griswold, Dr. Kerry Hipps and Dr. Jon Oatley cited several issues contributing to the school's fall in stature, including a declining ranking, poor strategic vision, deficient leadership of the athletics department, poor management of university resources, declining staff morale and administrative oversight by the WSU Board of Regents.
Those three professors also claim more than 200 staff members agree with their concerns.
Despite the uncertainty, the school does continue to embody the "underdog" mentality that was central to the testimony from WSU's representatives. The Cougars upset the University of Arizona in men's basketball on Thursday night, and are ranked in the AP Top 25 Poll for the first time in over 300 weeks.
