Oregon State's 2025 season?

[Regionals]

Does anyone have any firm idea about what is happening with Oregon State for this upcoming season in terms of conference alignment? There was buzz four months ago that they were in talks with the Big 12 to join them just for gymnastics, but I haven't seen any confirmation of that. How are they putting together a 2025 schedule this late in the game if they don't even know for sure what conference they're in?
The news from the PAC-12 is that Boise State, Colorado State, Fresno State, and San Diego State are going to join the conference (joining Oregon State and Washington State) starting in 2026. But that doesn't help for gymnastics.

 

[irichluck21]

That sucks for Mountain West, since Boise State was their 4th member and they established the conference last year.

I had heard that Oregon State would just be independent this year.

 

[Regionals]

That sucks for Mountain West, since Boise State was their 4th member and they established the conference last year.

I had heard that Oregon State would just be independent this year.

I hope that’s not the case, as it would be sad to be sitting idle while all the other teams are competing on conference championship Saturday. That’s also a score a lot of teams find useful for their final NQS before regionals.

Also, logistically, all the former PAC-12 teams that are now Big 12, Big 10, or ACC have to schedule the bulk of their meets for in-conference, which would make Oregon State have to cobble together a schedule based on spare weekends. The way I could see around the scheduling nightmare is to have Oregon State latch on as a third team in multiple what would have been dual meets.

 

[Nickp]

oregon state and boise state become gymnastics affiliates of the mountain west or air force utah state and sjsu become gymnastics affiliates of the pac 12

 

[irichluck21]

More than likely SJSU and Air Force would return back to MPSF. Utah State would probably join as well, since they used to be in the MRGC.

 

[Caligym]

I’m reading Air Force and UNLV are the next likely to be targeted to leave Mountain West for Pac 12. That would leave 3 gymnastics schools in each.

But the bigger problem, if that happens, is Mountain west will no longer have 8 schools to qualify as a conference.

 

[irichluck21]

It makes sense for Mountain West and Pac 12 to just merge together.
Call it Pacific-Mountain Conference. It mutually benefits all Universities involved and keeps the Pac-10/12 conference alive.

 

[Caligym]

Utah State and Gonzaga will join the Pac 12 and UTEP will join the Mountain West in 2026. The remaining members of the Mountain west have agreed to stay (so Air Force and UNLV, considered among the prime candidates to leave, will not). They will be looking to add one more school since Hawaii is football only. Pac 12 will be looking to add another school with football since Gonzaga has no team.

 

[Caligym]

It probably makes the most sense for SJSU and Air Force to join the Mountain Pacific for gymnastics, they already do so for other sports the Mountain West does not have enough teams for competition. Hopefully the Pac 12 picks up a school that has both football and gymnastics, but the pickings are getting slim. Their plans to try to add teams from the ACC does not look like it will happen, teams they were targeting have announced their plans to stay.

 

[irichluck21]

The other option is for SJSU and Air Force to join Pac 12 for gymnastics only.
This would allow Pac 12 to have a conference in gymnastics.

Oregon State, Utah State, Boise State are not enough.
Likely they will go back to MPSF.
But that still leaves Pac 12 with only 3 women's gymnastics teams, so no sponsored conference.

 

[Regionals]

Apparently, Oregon State will be independent for 2025, join the Big-12 for 2026, and then back to the PAC-12.

 

[Caligym]

Now that Pac 12’s plans to target ACC teams and expand to other parts of the country are all but dead, they will likely stay in the west. With the rest of the Mountain West taking themselves out of the running, Sac State is probably now on the list. They have a football team, a good size TV market, and are pushing hard to be asked to join. That would neatly solve the gymnastics problem beyond 2026 too.