Some don't care about this, and we all understand that this is a basketball decision. However, it is worth noting that the BIG 10, Pac-12, Big East, and ACC talk about academics when they are adding members. The WCC, by accident or by design, is one of the top undergraduate academic sports conferences in the nation. The MWC is at the opposite end of the spectrum. The reason conferences and schools consider the collective academic prestige of a conference is because, historically, the Universities you associate with has some impact on a schools perceived place in the academic strata, for what it's worth.
Observing this without malice, as many others have done, is not some sort of academic snobbery--it's just an observation of current rankings. Talented people who go on to accomplish a lot come out of all Universities, and many come from the school of hard knocks. Below, I separate National and Regional Universities (the distinction between the two is the number of graduate programs a University has). With that, here are the actual rankings from U.S. World News:
National Universities in the WCC and MWC:
#46 Pepperdine
#61 BYU
#90 San Diego
#110 San Francisco (tie)
#110 Pacific (tie)
#124 Colorado State
#140 SDSU
#159 Hawaii
#181 Wyoming
#192 New Mexico
#202 Nevada
#216 Utah State
#223 Fresno State
Unranked Boise State (they don't rank National Universities past #230)
Unranked UNLV
Western Regionally ranked Universities in the WCC and MWC:
#2 Santa Clara
#3 LMU
#4 Gonzaga
#6 Portland
#9 SMC
#35 San Jose State
(Up to 2017, UNLV, Boise, and Fresno were ranked in the 60's and 70's as Western Region Universities, but they were reclassified as Unranked National Universities, or--#223 for Fresno--for 2018).
Western Region University rankings go to #95 (46 more are Unranked).
Observing this without malice, as many others have done, is not some sort of academic snobbery--it's just an observation of current rankings. Talented people who go on to accomplish a lot come out of all Universities, and many come from the school of hard knocks. Below, I separate National and Regional Universities (the distinction between the two is the number of graduate programs a University has). With that, here are the actual rankings from U.S. World News:
National Universities in the WCC and MWC:
#46 Pepperdine
#61 BYU
#90 San Diego
#110 San Francisco (tie)
#110 Pacific (tie)
#124 Colorado State
#140 SDSU
#159 Hawaii
#181 Wyoming
#192 New Mexico
#202 Nevada
#216 Utah State
#223 Fresno State
Unranked Boise State (they don't rank National Universities past #230)
Unranked UNLV
Western Regionally ranked Universities in the WCC and MWC:
#2 Santa Clara
#3 LMU
#4 Gonzaga
#6 Portland
#9 SMC
#35 San Jose State
(Up to 2017, UNLV, Boise, and Fresno were ranked in the 60's and 70's as Western Region Universities, but they were reclassified as Unranked National Universities, or--#223 for Fresno--for 2018).
Western Region University rankings go to #95 (46 more are Unranked).
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