Boise State’s Mountain West title hopes in danger: It’s up to computers after UNLV loses
San Jose State went on the road Saturday and upset conference-leading UNLV, 37-31, muddying the waters in the Mountain West title race.
Boise State needed UNLV to beat the Spartans to guarantee the Broncos a spot in the championship game on Dec. 2. San Jose State’s win created a three-way tie for first place, with Boise State (7-5), UNLV (9-3) and the Spartans (7-5) all ending the season 6-2 in conference play.
That leaves four computer ranking systems to decide which teams will play for the title. Boise State owns a head-to-head win over San Jose State, and the Spartans obviously own the win over the Rebels, but UNLV and the Broncos did not play this season.
The Mountain West uses rankings from Jeff Anderson & Chris Hester, Colley’s Matrix Rankings, Massey Ratings and Peter R. Wolfe as its tiebreaker when other methods — such as College Football Playoff ranking and head-to-head records — don’t adequately do the job. That’s the case this year because none of the top four teams is ranked by the CFP.
UNLV (34.75) and Boise State (64) were ahead of San Jose State (71.25) in the computer tally heading into this weekend.
UNLV is likely in the title game no matter what — for the Rebels to somehow drop behind both Boise State and SJSU is hard to imagine. The question becomes whether the Spartans can jump a team that beat them to get another shot at the Rebels in the championship game.
San Jose State blew a 27-7 lead at Albertsons Stadium and lost 35-27 to Boise State on Oct. 7, dropping the Spartans to 1-5 on the season. They haven’t lost since, reeling off six straight conference wins.
All four ranking systems should be updated by Sunday afternoon, and the conference will announce the pairing.
Boise State did all it could to earn a spot in the title game for the sixth time in the past seven years. After a 4-5 start, the Broncos ended the regular season with three straight wins, including a 27-19 victory over Air Force on Friday.
This story was originally published November 25, 2023 at 4:03 PM.
