The days of waiting with bated breath for the Mountain West men’s basketball schedule to be released, scrolling down the list of games and hoping you don’t see the words “in Wyoming” are over.

After more than a decade of resistance from San Diego State, the 11-team conference finally switched to a 20-game schedule, meaning everyone plays each other indoors and outdoors, including a trip to the 7,000-foot Laramie Arena-Auditorium.

That means the Aztecs will play at all 10 venues in the Mountain West this season, starting Dec. 4 at Fresno State — the earliest conference play in school history — and continuing for three months until the finale against Nevada at Viejas Arena on March 8.

“It’s a full-circle tournament,” said coach Brian Dutcher, who has actively lobbied against switching from an 18-game schedule to a 20-game schedule to give the nonconference team more flexibility to build an NCAA Tournament resume. “It used to be that you wanted to see two teams where everybody played once. Now it’s a full-circle tournament, so you play everybody twice.”

Is he okay with that?

“I have to be,” Dutcher said. “That’s just the way it is.”

The conference sent a tentative schedule to schools last month with the option to release it on their own terms. SDSU did so Wednesday, joining Utah State and UNLV as the only teams to do so.

Many of the dates will likely change when a definitive schedule is announced next month after TV partners CBS and Fox choose to move their games up or down a day. It will also dictate the tough parts of the schedule, as it could mean shorter turnarounds between games and whether the Aztecs have time to get back home on back-to-back road trips.

However, no change is expected in the ranking of competitors.

After the Dec. 4 opener, the Aztecs go 24 days before playing another conference game — at home against Utah State — then receive the first of two byes on New Year’s Day. After that, they play 18 games over nine weeks, with their remaining bye coming in early February.

It starts innocently enough. The Aztecs have a six-game winning streak at Fresno State’s Save Mart Center, including a 73-41 win last year; and they are 10-0 against Utah State at Viejas Arena since 2013-14, when the Aggies joined the Mountain West.

But the next two Saturdays feature road games against teams expected to be the first and second-place picks in the conference: Boise State and New Mexico. The Aztecs have lost six of their last seven games at Boise’s ExtraMile Arena and four of their last six at The Pit in Albuquerque.

There are three sets of consecutive away trips: at Air Force (Jan. 21) and Nevada (Jan. 25), at Colorado State (Feb. 8) and San Jose State (Feb. 11), and at Wyoming (March 1) and UNLV (March 4). Only the Air Force-Nevada dual has two altitude games, and the effects are usually most noticeable on the third and fourth days at altitude.

There are a few anomalies. The Aztecs have just two weeks between their two games against Air Force and San Jose State, but more than five weeks pass before they see Boise State and New Mexico for the second time.

Other highlights:

• The Mountain West uses a Tuesday-Saturday format as its primary day, instead of the historical Wednesday-Saturday format. Conference games can technically be played any day of the week, but must be separated by two full days off.

• The Aztecs will face teams they have historically beaten at Viejas Arena in the first half of the schedule: Utah State, Air Force, Colorado State, UNLV, San Jose State and Wyoming.

• Both breaks come before tough road games, meaning Dutcher and his team will have a full week to prepare for games at Boise State on Jan. 4 and Colorado State on Feb. 8.

• The Aztecs tied against Nevada for the fifth time in the last eight seasons.

• Road games at Boise State (Jan. 4) and New Mexico (Jan. 11) and UNLV’s home game (Jan. 18) are likely candidates for national broadcasts on major networks CBS or Fox, which would mean late Saturday morning or early afternoon.

• The expanded conference schedule shortens the nonconference schedule by two games. SDSU is scheduling one more home date before announcing it, but we already know six: home games against Gonzaga and Cal Baptist, plus four games on neutral courts (Creighton, Oregon and Texas A&M in Las Vegas during Thanksgiving week and Cal in San Jose on Dec. 21). The remaining five games are all expected to be at Viejas Arena.

2024-25 Mountain West schedule

December 4th: At Fresno State

December 28th: Utah State

January 4th: Boise State

January 7th: Air Force

January 11: In New Mexico

January 14: Colorado State

January 18th: UNLV

January 21st: In the Air Force

January 25th: In Nevada

January 28: San Jose State

February 1st:Wyoming

February 8th: In the State of Colorado

February 11th: In San Jose State

February 15th: Boise State

February 18th: Fresno State

February 22: In Utah State

February 25th: New Mexico

March 1st: In Wyoming

March 4th: At UNLV

March 8th: Nevada

March 12-15: Mountain West Tournament, Las Vegas

Original Release Date: September 4, 2024 11:10 am