Utah is good at one sport in a conference that is a sinking ship. To the extent visibility matters (it does) and recruits care about what tv's they might be on (they do) and dollars buy things (for now), the Pac(whatever) is in trouble, and nobody is throwing them a lifeline. Utah hasn't been invited anywhere. Oregon and Washington, way more marketable brands, HAVEN'T BEEN INVITED ANYWHERE.

Nationally, I see a lot of people laughing at the remaining Pac(whatever) teams who seem oblivious to the danger that they are in. None of them have an invite to join another conference. None of them can take it for granted that an invite would be forthcoming. The BigTen clearly wasn't interested in Utah in particular, and the BigXII hasn't telegraphed any interest in taking the utes either. The SEC is not going to call. Utah is the sixth best brand left in the Pac(whatever) at best.

So, what's Utah to do? They'll stay in the Pac(whatever) until it dies, it is more their identity than anything else; but the reality is that it will devolve into the MWC 2.0. And that's OK. Pac(whatever) schools and fans don't actually care about sports. It seems to be the thing that unites the Pac(whatever) more than anything else. Utah students had a more passionate response to Ben Shapiro speaking on campus than they have had with any basketball game this century. You can't build long term, or short term, success in the face of such apathy. But that's OK. Utah can cling to the myth of their academic superiority (in which kids who can't get into BYU are getting full tuition scholarships to Utah) and be smug about being woke and all that nonsense and be in a club of similarly situated schools. It'll be great.

(On a side note, it really is sad that a large majority of Utah fans are not actually Utah fans. They are anti-BYU fans; or they are PAC12 fans; or something else. I don't see a lot of Utah fandom. I understand this, as I do have a degree from Utah and BYU, and studying there I heard more of "we aren't BYU" than "we are Utah." Nobody seemed to be proud to be Utah. They all were proud of something else.)