The Mountain West Conference’s upcoming television contract possibilities — and the University of Hawaii’s potential place in them — just got a whole lot more interesting.

Revelations about the American Athletic Conference’s new blockbuster 12-year, $1 billion — yes, that’s with a “B” — TV deal with ESPN and the emerging role of the new ESPN+ streaming service could provide a blueprint for some of what might lie ahead for the MWC, UH and the Rainbow Warriors’ fans.

Until this week the AAC, which is the rebranded, football-playing remnants of the old Big East Conference and subsequent additions, and the MWC had a lot in common.

Both are outside the more well-heeled Power Five elite of college athletics and both have TV contracts that end with the 2019-20 academic year. UH’s local rights deal with Spectrum is on the same timeline as the MWC, concluding June 30, 2020.

The AAC has set the bar high for non-Power Five leagues with its contract, which Sports Business Daily said will pay each school an average of $6.94 million per year, dwarfing the approximately $2 million per year they had been getting.

Now the MWC, whose Board of Directors meet in May, tries to match or exceed the AAC’s nearly four-fold jump with its next deal, which could be announced in the next six months and begin in 2020-21.

The 12-member MWC currently guarantees Boise State at least $1.8 million per year and then all members, except UH, which is a football-only participant, get a share, which averages about $1.1 million.

UH, however, retains its local rights fees of approximately $2.6 million from Spectrum but must first make its football inventory available to MWC partners ESPN and the CBS Sports Network and is required to furnish Spectrum at least seven games from what MWC partners turn down in order to realize a minimum guarantee. Most of UH’s other sports come under the Big West Conference TV contract with ESPN.

In re-upping with ESPN, Sports Business Journal said, the AAC, like the Sun Belt Conference before it, was required to move most of its content to the year-old ESPN+ platform, a direct streaming service.

The network’s website said ESPN+ is “not available on ESPN’s linear TV or digital networks(s)” and a separate subscription must be purchased (currently at $4.99 a month). As of February, ESPN+ reportedly had two million subscribers.

Like the Sun Belt, which reached an agreement with ESPN last year, the AAC is expected to be responsible for producing much of the content it supplies to ESPN. None of this single-mounted camera or student-produced material currently streamed on some league sites.

Sun Belt schools, which were required to provide 500 events a year across 18 sports, reportedly invested as much as $500,000 each in equipment and operators. The Sun Belt used the same consultant, the Wasserman Media Group, as the MWC employs.

But with the AAC and subsequent deals, ESPN is likely seeking a higher level of quality in production of the events streamed.

If the MWC strikes a deal with ESPN with similar ESPN+ scope that includes inventory not picked up by the current ESPN platforms, ESPN2, ESPNU, etc., you wonder if that could take Spectrum out of UH football or reduce its offerings?

While that could be good for the consumer, who would just have to pay $4.99 per month under the current plan and could cancel out of football season instead of buying pay-per-view, it would likely reduce the rights fees UH pockets locally.

How the MWC contract goes could mark a major change in the UH TV landscape.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.