The Pac-12's sneaky realignment will actually help the conference survive its destruction

This is For The Win’s daily newsletter, The Morning Win. Did a friend recommend or forward this to you? If so, subscribe here. Have feedback? Leave your questions, comments and concerns through this brief reader survey! Now, here’s Mike Sykes.

Good morning, Winners! Welcome back to the Morning Win. Thanks so much for rocking with us today. Appreciate you.

While you were sleeping, the Pac-12 was fighting for its survival.

The conference has reportedly coaxed four Mountain West teams into applying to become members of the Pac-12, according to reporting from Yahoo! Sports’ Ross Dellenger. Boise State, San Diego State, Fresno State and Colorado State are all expected to apply or have already applied for membership in the conference.

The move is all but official. The Pac-12 is already outside, thumping its chest.

Those four teams will join the Pac-12 by 2026, pushing it closer to the eight teams needed to remain an FBS conference. The NCAA has given the Pac-12 a two-year grace period to find more members to go along with Oregon State and Washington State, which are the only two teams currently left. Swiping these Mountain West teams is only the first step of a multi-step plan, Dellenger says.

You’d think the Mountain West would be negotiating with the Pac-12 from a place of power over these last few months after agreeing to a 2024 scheduling pact with the Pac-12 playing against the conference.

But things have gotten icy over the last few months, The Athletic reports, partially because of this move. The plan for the Pac-12 seems to have always been to coax Mountain West schools to make the jump.

This would always happen as soon as these two conferences began working together. The TV money will be better in the Pac-12. As it stands, Mountain West schools only make around $6 million annually from TV deals. There’s more money waiting if they make the jump to the Pac-12. And the conference would reportedly pay any Mountain West exit fees the teams incur, which sweetens the pot quite a bit.

But, man. Conference realignment. I won’t lie — I’m so tired of this.

I can’t blame the Pac-12 completely. It needed to do this to survive. This is only a ripple effect from 10 teams leaving the conference last year. Now, it’s got a much better path to the eight teams it needs. By 2026, it’ll be eligible for consideration for an automatic bid in the playoff or at least more cash.

But this is a tough day for the Mountain West. The conference is losing a third of its teams in the next two years and will have to scramble to recover. It’ll probably look to pulling up some FCS schools, which is fine.

But this is a lot. College football is becoming a lot. It’s chaotic. Keeping up with who plays where is a chore. Teams are bouncing from coast to coast every week.

It’d be nice for the football to matter most again. Maybe we’ll get back to that one day.

A’ja Wilson makes history

A’ja Wilson added another feather to her MVP cap on Wednesday night when she became the WNBA’s all-time single-season leader for points in a season.

She only needed 12 points to break Jewell Loyd’s 939-point record she pulled that off pretty easily. Here’s the bucket:

But what really got me was how emotional she got when crediting her teammates for her accomplishment.

“The points are great. They’re going to always be there. I’m never going to stop shooting. But the group that we have in this locker room is something that I’m so genuinely happy to be around.”

What a moment for Wilson and the Aces. This has been a pretty rough season for the team (some of that is their own fault, btw), but this is a bright spot.

Wilson only needs 44 points from here to become the first 1,000-point scorer in a single season in league history. That’s a matter of “when” and not “if.” More history is coming.

Don’t run more, run better

Our Christian D’Andrea did a deep dive on the gaudy rushing totals in the NFL for Week 1. Teams didn’t throw the ball as well, but the ground game across the league seemed to be a lot better to start this season.

But the catch is teams weren’t actually running the ball more — they just did it extremely well.

Here’s Christian with more detail:

“It may have felt like Week 1 of the 2024 NFL season featured more run plays, but it wasn’t excessively more ground based than 2023. What it *was* however, was a much more efficient attack.

…

From an efficiency standpoint, runners were about as solid on the ground as they were in 2022 and each team ran the ball roughly one more time per game than they did two years earlier. There’s an explosion in rushing touchdowns here, but ultimately things aren’t too different than they were two years ago.”

Christian says we’re looking at a bit of an evolution here in the NFL. Defenses have become better at taking away the deep ball, leading to shrinking passing numbers and better boxes to run against.

In short, this is a pretty good season to be a running back. At least it seems to be so far, anyway.

Why rushing attacks were so dominant in Week 1

Quick hits: Michael Penix to the rescue? … Caitlin and Kate … And more

— Cory Woodroof says Michael Penix can’t save the Falcons until they give up on Kirk Cousins. Y’all. We’re in Week 2.

— Caitlin Clark told her BFF Kate Martin to come guard her when the Fever played the Aces and I just love these two’s friendship. Here’s Charles Curtis with more.

— SHANNON SHARPE NOOOOOOOO. Cory has more.

— Patrick Mahomes had the most relatable response to Dylan Raiola idolizing him. Here’s Robert Zeglinski with more.

— Here’s Blake Schuster with watchability rankings for this weekend in College Football.

— The White Sox are … still the White Sox. Here’s Andrew Joseph with more.

That’s a wrap, folks. Thanks for reading! We out.

-Sykes ✌️