Can we please have a moment of sympathy and a box of tissue handy for the Boise State football team’s plight?

Yes, the Broncos will be forced to make an all-expenses-paid trip to Hawaii this year after all.

Instead of vaulting to the Big East Conference in football in 2012 — which would have been the Broncos’ third different conference in as many seasons — Boise State will be subjected to a second consecutive go-around in the Mountain West.

Which, to Boise State’s way of thinking, apparently, smacks of repeating ninth grade.

If it had been up to the Broncos, they would have bolted from the MWC and their commitment to stay through the 2012 season immediately upon reaching agreement with the Big East in October. But, then, that would have also obligated the Broncos to approximately $10 million in costs to extricate themselves from the MWC and move sports other than football into the Western Athletic Conference.

And, unaided, their piggy bank can’t underwrite that level of ambition at the moment.

Three weeks ago Boise State president Bob Kustra said as much but framed it as a matter of the Broncos doing the right thing by their MWC brethren, including 2012 member-to-be UH. Kustra told the Idaho Statesman newspaper, “It’s too late (to jump to the Big East for 2012). I can’t imagine how anyone can pull that off. We would never want to pull it off in a fashion that dealt shabbily with our existing partners in the Mountain West. I don’t think that could ever work,” Kustra said.

But when the Big East got $20 million from West Virginia’s exit, Kustra apparently forgot all about collegiality and “shabby” dealing if the conference would pay the bills.

When the Big East balked at the price tag and latched onto Temple as a cheaper alternative, hopes of a Big East arrival for Boise State before 2013 were dashed. Finally, Kustra came clean, saying, “While there certainly would have been advantages in making the move a year early, it became clear that it would not be fiscally responsible, as all expenses associated with early entry into two conferences would not be covered.”

Of course it was less than two years ago that Kustra declared allegiance to the MWC, saying, “We are eager to play a key role in the future of the (MWC)” and said he embraced the MWC as a conference that “affords our student-athletes travel schedules that minimize disruption to their studies.”

Had Boise State fled to the Big East in ’12, it would have marked the second time in three years that UH would have had to do 11th-hour hunting for a schedule replacement. When Boise ditched the WAC for the MWC, UH had to scramble for a replacement and paid Tulane $400,000 to fill the opening on the 2011 schedule. For ’12, UH could have been stuck with 11 games or playing two out-of-subdivision opponents.

Soon after Boise State announced it was skipping out on the WAC, a UH administrator ran into a top Broncos official at a mainland meeting. How about scheduling a nonconference game with Hawaii, the UH figure asked?

Silently, the Boise State official kept on walking.

In ’12, the Broncos won’t be able to.

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