The late University of Hawaii athletic director Stan Sheriff once observed that when "that damn Cougar roars, you can feel it all the way (here)."

The "damn Cougar," in this case, meant Brigham Young University football and it was Sheriff’s colorful way of saying that what BYU did 3,000 miles away in Provo, Utah, often impacted UH.

It was sage advice 30 years ago when BYU ruled the old Western Athletic Conference and is worth remembering in today’s volatile climate.

Ever since BYU bolted the Mountain West Conference in 2011, a league it was instrumental in helping create 11 years earlier, to go independent, the feeling has persisted the Cougars might eventually find their way back. Left hanging has been the fear what it might mean for UH.

And, once again, there are rumblings with CBS Sports.com reporting "there was informal mention of the Cougars rejoining the league" at MWC meetings in Phoenix two weeks ago.

While it is unlikely to lead to anything anytime soon, it is something to keep an eye on down the road amid other developments across the landscape, especially if you are UH, the MWC’s sole football-only member.

For example, both the Atlantic Coast Conference and Southeastern Conference have recently decreed, as part of their new scheduling philosophy, that their members should each play at least one nonconference game against opponents from the so-called Power Five conferences (Pac-12, Big 12, Big Ten, SEC and ACC) each year to boost conference power ratings for national championship consideration.

And BYU, unlike Notre Dame, which is also an independent, does not meet that standard, the SEC and ACC have decided.

It does not prohibit them from playing BYU, just not as counting toward the Power Five requirement.

That’s still a potential blow, both in prestige and scheduling, for the Cougars, who someday hope to reach a national championship game themselves for the first time since 1984. So far, they have found themselves playing in middling bowls, Bell Helicopter, Poinsettia and Fight Hunger, in three years as an independent, with the Miami Bowl on deck. At some point the MWC route might look like a better alternative, especially if TV considerations can be worked out.

It was a big bowl snub in 1996 that helped prompt BYU to start thinking about exiting the WAC. That brought the founding of the MWC and left UH high and dry in a watered-down WAC.

And it was BYU’s subsequent bolt from the MWC, after being passed over by the Big 12 and Pac-12, that helped eventually open MWC membership for UH.

While a return to the MWC by BYU would be cheered for helping to raise the conference’s power ratings, it could have the flip side of also making UH expendable. For it is doubtful the current 12-member MWC really wants to go to an unwieldy 13 or sees much current value in anybody else it could add to make an even 14.

That can be an awkward position to be in when you are an already struggling UH and 20 of your 21 teams are located in other conferences.

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