hope they won't see this as unnecessarily derogatory. But this is the type of game and arrangement that an Indiana or Minnesota arranges when stepping out of their conference. Ohio State or FSU doesn't do a home and home with NIU for the reasons you state. Very little to gain, and a lot to lose as they can be good enough to beat you. BYU plays them because they are a good team outside of the power conferences and they have very few home and home options. But I do think it demonstrates that people don't perceive Utah to be on a higher plane than BYU or any of the other top-tier mid-majors.

I am not so pessimistic as to their chances to say that they can't ever become top-half of the PAC-12, but they certainly aren't perceived to be there yet. Like BYU, they are still good enough to upset you, but not good enough to get a lot of credit in beating them. The PAC-12 hasn't elevated their status as much as the local media would make an outsider observer think. Having said that, I still envy them having guaranteed dates with USC, Stanford and Oregon. While I was at Indiana and the team was getting throttled by the best teams in the Big-10 year in and year out, and having opposing fans outnumber yours three or four times over in your home stadium, I never heard anyone wish they were winning the MAC instead.