UC Davis Athletics bids the Big West farewell and prepares for Mountain West in the 2026-27 season

Starting this fall, UC Davis athletes will face off against a whole new set of conference competitors

On Dec. 10, 2024, UC Davis Athletics and the Mountain West Conference announced that UC Davis would be moving from the Big West Conference to the Mountain West Conference effective July 1, 2026.

All sports sponsored by the Mountain West will be moving except for football, which will remain in the Big Sky Conference. Water polo and beach volleyball are not sponsored by the Mountain West, so these teams will remain in the Big West as affiliate members. Equestrian, field hockey and lacrosse do not currently compete in the Big West and will not move to the Mountain West; instead, they will stay in their respective conferences.

The Aggies have been a member of the Big West since 2007, when they moved from the Division II level to Division I. The conference is mainly made up of the University of California (UC) and California State University (CSU) campuses.

“There was a lot of movement on the West Coast here, between the Pac-12, Mountain West, West Coast Conference and Big West, and when we received sort of an opportunity to have a conversation with the Mountain West Conference, that was really appealing for us,” UC Davis Athletic Director Rocko DeLuca said. “Not just because of the complement to our athletics program and the number of sports that they had that were similar to ours, but also to help increase the geographic footprint and the exposure for the institution.”

Unlike the Big West, the Mountain West has members located all across the Western United States, such as Arizona, Colorado and Nevada.

“The hope is that we'll start to draw some additional out-of-state students from along the front range — Phoenix, Las Vegas — you know, places where we'll be more regularly competing where we don't usually get that opportunity,” DeLuca said.

In addition, the Mountain West will also give UC Davis athletics more television coverage.

“The Big West only has two linear television opportunities every year right now. In our new league, we're going to have 58 opportunities to potentially be on linear TV,” DeLuca said. “So, in terms of increasing the profile and increasing the, I would say, sizzle related to our game environment, our new conference certainly provides a better opportunity for UC Davis than the one we're departing.”

With a larger geographic footprint comes increased travel for student-athletes.

“Fortunately, many of the locations are easily accessible by air, much like our trips to Southern California, where we spend a lot of time,” DeLuca said. “Our academic staff has been working to ensure that we're going to be able to support the student athletes on the academic side of the house.”

As a member of the Mountain West, UC Davis will also be receiving revenue distribution from the conference. These funds will be reinvested in the athletics program.

Although football could potentially join the rest of the teams in the Mountain West in the future, the team is not quite ready to make the jump from the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) to the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), according to DeLuca.

“We've got an agreement with the Mountain West that if they consider future FCS football members, that we'd be considered,” DeLuca said. “The reality is we need to make some improvements to UC Davis Health Stadium to be able to monetize an FBS football program. Our stadium is just not big enough to create the kind of revenue to support FBS football at this stage.”

UC Davis teams have had success in recent competitions with Mountain West teams, inspiring hope that the Aggies will thrive in the new conference. The men’s basketball team beat the University of Nevada, Reno this past season, and the season before, they beat Grand Canyon University. Both of the teams will be their Mountain West competitors.

“I'm encouraged that many of our sports are going to be competitive initially,” DeLuca said. “And I think we've got a little bit of a longer build for some of our programs. It's going to take us a couple of years to build up the back-end resources and environment that we want to match; you know, these programs have been doing high-level Division I sports for 80 years in some cases. We're going to be in year 20 in our Division I history. So, they've got a little bit of a head start as it relates to some of those foundational elements, but we’ll try to close the gap as fast as we can.”

Mountain West play will begin this fall with men’s soccer, women’s soccer and volleyball taking on new conference competitors.

Written by: Colina Harvey — sports@theaggie.org