The way I remember it is BYU had the deal with the WAC, and we're going to make an awesome BBALL conference plus a good fball scheduling deal. Word got back to hair thompson of the plan because it wasn't kept under wraps. To thwart the plan Hair quickly invited the key WAC schools to MWC thinking this would effectively eliminate the WAC as a viable option and BYU would be forced to stay in MWC. However, the WCC came in at the 11th hour and BYU decided to go for that option. Unfortunately, it was shortly after that we had the Big 12 spot open up earlier than we were thinking and instead of quickly jumping we stuck with the WCC since they where so good to us, (BYU also wanted to move slowly with assuarances because of the worries of Big 12 stability.) TCU had no such concerns, nailed down there Big 12 deal in a couple of hours, over a beer, while BYU was still being slow and "difficult". TCU effectively stole our invite and then screwed over the Big East. And then screwed us over again with a ridiculas one and done game in Arlington that was never returned and BYU hasn't really put any new Big 12 teams on the schedule in a meaningful way since.

BYU got black balled by the big 12 which apparently still held some grudge even 5 years later.