WAC Expansion: Conference Extends 2012 Invitation To UT Arlington

Not satisfied with welcoming one new member who'll be fielding its first-ever varsity football program in 2011, one that can't win in AA ball, and two more schools primarily in play for their basketball teams, the WAC has officially invited the University of Texas at Arlington to join the ranks of Division I-A, welcoming to a wannabe AQ BCS conference an institution that doesn't play football and will apparently not be bound to try:

Should the University of Texas System board of regents approve the recommendation join the WAC, UT Arlington will join the conference beginningJuly 1, 2012, in all sports but football. The agenda document notes that "the WAC is a football bowl subdivision conference where football is important, but UT Arlington’s invitation is not conditioned on starting a football program."

The Mavericks, who finished second from the bottom of the Southland West last season in men's basketball, would join hoops members Denver and Seattle, UT San Antonio in year one of gridiron play under Larry Coker (hey, Larry Coker!), and Texas State, which boasts a nonwinning Southland tradition in an entirely different sport, as WACspansion teams in 2012. This move would follow the departure of Boise State to the Mountain West, Utah to the Pac-12, and BYU's arrival in the WAC as a basketball member, and coincide with Hawaii, Fresno State, and Nevada bolting to the Mountain West and TCU decamping for the Big East. Got all that? New conference crest reads, in Latin: "You can get there from here."