Let’s start by going back five years to 2018 to loosely connect now-retired Mountain West commish Craig Thompson and the newly minted MW commissioner Gloria Nevarez and Gonzaga basketball.
Maybe an odd way to begin, but for the MW audience, appropriate.
Thompson had “publicly courted” Gonzaga from the WCC and triggered heavy speculation the Zags would be the 12th team to join the Mountain West. But weeks later, Thompson announced they could not add the Bulldogs.
At about the same time, Nevarez’ first task as the new WCC commissioner was to scramble and work with Gonzaga to fully represent the conference.