The Mountain West had more parity at the top than just about every conference in college basketball this season.
The result of that parity was constant close matchups, absurd finishes and a league that could get as many as seven bids to the NCAA tournament if UNLV wins the tourney in Las Vegas this week.
Utah State had an entirely new roster and new head coach this season, and yet the Aggies won the regular season title.
Defending national runner-up San Diego State is a five seed in this tournament and is also expected to be a five seed in the NCAA tournament.
Colorado State beat Creighton and Colorado in the non-conference and is a seven seed this week.
Boise State and Nevada are hardly flashy teams, but non-conference wins over Saint Mary's and TCU show their underlying quality. Boise State beat SDSU twice and Nevada won seven straight to close the season.
The league is pretty safely expected to have five bids (SDSU, Utah State, Nevada, Colorado State and Boise State), with New Mexico needing multiple wins this week to have a shot at an at-large bid.
The league hasn't had much NCAA tournament success — aside from the Aztecs last year — but the conference tournament is poised to be one of the most wide open and exciting during Champ Week.
San Diego State is the betting favorite by virtue of being the highest power-rated team in the field, but its path and road form leaves some vulnerabilities.
The 11-team field gives byes to the top five teams, with the bottom six playing against one another on the opening day (Wednesday).
Dive in below for a full 2024 Mountain West tournament betting preview.
Mountain West Tournament Odds
| Team Name | Odds (Via FanDuel) |
| San Diego State | +240 |
| New Mexico | +500 |
| Nevada | +500 |
| Utah State | +500 |
| Boise State | +700 |
| UNLV | +800 |
| Colorado State | +850 |
| Wyoming | +25000 |
| Fresno State | +25000 |
| San Jose State | +25000 |
| Air Force | +25000 |
Mountain West Tournament Bracket
Top Half of the Bracket
San Diego State would be favored over Utah State in a potential rubber match on a neutral court in the semis, but the Aztecs' resume outside of Viejas Arena is pretty mediocre this year.
They played a road game against all of the other six contenders in the league and didn't win a single matchup. It was partly tough scheduling, but it's also interesting given that last year the Aztecs had beaten similarly-talented Utah State and Colorado State on the road.
The Aztecs have a difficult opening matchup in a quasi road game against UNLV in the quarterfinals on Thursday.
Because the league has seven highly-competitive teams, that means that top seed Utah State will get by far the easiest quarterfinal. The Aggies will face off against the winner of Wyoming and Fresno State — likely Wyoming. The Aggies smashed Wyoming at home and won by eight in Laramie.
Wyoming's lack of ball pressure makes life relatively easy for the USU guards to get the ball inside as much as possible.
Fresno State's complete inability to shoot the ball from the perimeter or rebound has led to its offense completely cratering in the second half of the year. Since Feb. 1, the Bulldogs are 280th in Offensive Efficiency. Even though Wyoming finished 3-7, it's hard to get past the fact that the Cowboys just won at Fresno by 39 on Saturday.
Fresno was a 1.5-point home favorite on Saturday, and the KenPom projection expects Wyoming to lay five on a neutral. Fresno State has lost four games by 20+ in the last six.
I'd suggest chasing an alternate spread on Wyoming, given the depth, availability and effort question marks for Fresno State. It might seem like a decent buy spot on Fresno, but I'm not interested.
Bottom Half of the Bracket
Quarterfinal Thursday has the potential to be an incredible quadruple header in the MWC, and the night session could be one of the best tickets in all of conference tournament week.
If the projections hold, Colorado State will play Nevada and Boise State will play New Mexico.
The Rams will be favored by 15 on Wednesday against San Jose State, a team it had few issues handling in the regular season.
Colorado State has some weaknesses against physical interior teams. For example, last year's version of SJSU might've given the Rams some problems. This year, SJSU is the second-worst offensive rebounding team and a bottom-three defensive rebounding team. It's by far the worst perimeter defense in the conference, and Niko Medved's motion offense should carve it open.
You could make the case for Air Force as a 15-point underdog to New Mexico. The Lobos are likely to miss the NCAA tournament because of its home loss in The Pit to Air Force last month.
On one hand, the Lobos need at least two wins to have a shot at the NCAA tournament and would need four wins in four days to win this bid. They aren't incentivized to run up the score given those circumstances.
On the other hand, New Mexico is playing for style points and revenge in the first round.
Unless Air Force runs ungodly hot from 3 again, New Mexico should force plenty of turnovers, get free rim points and dominate in transition. It's not a good matchup on paper for Air Force, except for the fact that the Falcons shoot and can make a ton of 3s.
Given New Mexico's offensive limitations from 3, the Lobos could get stuck trading 2s for 3s like the last meeting. Air Force is more equipped than SJSU to pull an upset because of its high variance approach, but that's where you'd much rather back the extreme outcomes than the standard spread -110 bet on Air Force.
Maybe target some Air Force first-half moneyline, sprinkle for another shocker or a +7.5 alternate spread.
Either way, the favorites should have no problem setting up a four-team mini bracket for a spot in the final.
Colorado State would have the backcourt advantage against Nevada because of Isaiah Stevens, but the Wolf Pack have won three straight in the series and has the better rim defense. That's a major key against Colorado State's offense.
Boise State swept the season series with New Mexico, as well. Max Rice scored 35 points and hit seven 3s in The Pit to win, but Boise State dominated the offensive glass in both meetings, and I'm not sure the Lobos have a solve for that.
In a coin flip game, BSU had a 37% and 41% offensive rebounding rate. Boise is likely to get more rebounds and make more 3s, which puts more pressure on the shotmaking of the UNM guards to overcome that.
I'd look to bet Boise as a pick'em or worse in that potential quarterfinal matchup.
The Case for Nevada
Nevada faded pretty hard at the end of last season, losing three of its final five games prior to the MWC tournament. The Wolf Pack then lost the 4-5 matchup in the MWC quarterfinal to San Jose State and were blown out in the NCAA tournament play-in game in Dayton against Arizona State.
Steve Alford has one of the oldest teams in the country this season, and it's largely the same roster from the last few years of MWC play. The Wolf Pack are versatile, and they've been the best team in the conference over the last six weeks.
Since February began, Nevada is 10-1 and ranks 14th in Bart Torvik Adjusted Efficiency. The next best team in the league is SDSU at 26th.
The league is dominated by home courts, especially since it has so much parity at the top. The recipe is usually to hold serve on your own home court, beat the bottom four on the road and try to steal one road game against a fellow top team. Nevada won on the road against Utah State, Colorado State and Boise State.
Boise also had three quality away wins, which meant that those two had the most impressive away-from-home resumes in the league. San Diego State and Utah State combined for one total road win all season against the other tournament-caliber teams.
The Wolf Pack have a lot of length and interior size that can bother their likely quarterfinal opponent, Colorado State. The Rams have an elite motion offense and one of the best point guards in the country in Stevens, but Nevada beat them home and away in the regular season.
Given that they also would avoid SDSU — the conference's best team — until the final, Nevada at +500 or better is my favorite MWC tournament future.
