Podcast with "The Commish"
Dan Butterly joins us to discuss UC San Diego's move to the WCC
Prepping for a family vacation to Disney World, Big West Commissioner Dan Butterly got some news he didn’t want to hear. UC San Diego, who had joined the Big West shortly after he took the reins in 2020, had decided to leave the conference, starting with the 2027-28 academic year, to join the West Coast Conference.
In his own weekly newsletter, “The Bold Type,” he admitted that this was a surprise, even to him. As it unfolded, facts emerged that UC San Diego had been courted by the rival league for nearly a year, before making their decision. The timing seemed odd, based on UC San Diego’s recent basketball success, as well as the fact that the WCC was losing it’s standard-bearer in Gonzaga, while St. Mary’s has been said to be weighing offers from the Mountain West, and newly-reconstituted Pac-12.
With the Tritons off to greener pastures, the question becomes “what’s next?” In the sense that the WCC may be looking at additional Big West schools willing to make the move, and follow UC San Diego. Mark Patton mentions UC Santa Barbara in his recent Noozhawk piece. When the Pac-12 got gobbled up by the Big Ten and Big Twelve, the dominoes didn’t necessarily fall expeditiously, but they did eventually fall, and that is something that Commissioner Butterly would most certainly want to head off at The (Cajon?) Pass. Hear it straight from the Commissioner’s mouth on the most recent edition of the podcast.