Category: Boise State

The season is almost here. 9 days.

Can you feel the excitement?!

I have spent the summer reading about the Broncos and the WAC and what could happen. First off, it has been great hearing Boise State mentioned in nearly every single national season preview article I’ve seen all year (not to mention all the “who is the next Boise State?” articles). Absolutely amazing. If you would have told me 5 years ago that we would be this well covered, I would have called you crazy. I read that the fallout from the Fiesta Bowl has been estimated to be over $100 million in free publicity for Boise State University and the State of Idaho. I can absolutely believe that.

Second… most, if not all of the articles that mention Boise State, or the WAC are pointing to the showdown November 23rd on the Island as Boise State visits Hawaii. People are calling that the battle for the BCS. Hyping it beyond belief. I want to get on the record, here before the season even starts with this:

University of Hawaii WILL have at least one loss before we meet them for that game.

I know they have a cupcake schedule (including two 1-AA teams) and have the offense from hell. But what no one is talking about is their defense. Last year, they were middle of the WAC or lower in just about every defensive statistical category. Plus, they lost their defensive coordinator, Jerry Glanville, who headed off to be the head coach of Portland State. Yeah, they bring back 8 defensive starters, but none of those guys were all that good to begin with. Historically, their defense has never been good under June Jones. Nor have they EVER played well when on the mainland.

You watch. Someone will catch them napping. Brennan will have an off day (or perhaps an injury), and the typical Hawaii defense will give up enough points to lose.
Best bets for their losses? I’m going with at San Jose State (10/12) – an improving team with good speed… New Mexico State ON the island (10/28)they have a great QB too… or at Nevada (11/16) provided Nevada can get some fans in the stands and show up to play. Both of those are iffy. The wild card is Fresno. Who knows what they will do this year.

Honestly, absolutely nothing in the world would make me happier than to see Idaho step up in that temple of gloom they play in up there and spank Hawaii back to Oahu. If they can get an offense, the Vandie’s D just might be good enough to pull something like that off.

My favorite Hawaii story was the game in 2004 here. We had a game with them that was on ESPN. Their QB, Timmy Chang, was all set to break the 1-A passing yards record in the game. He needed 241 yard and had been averaging well over 300 for the season. Seemed like a no brainer.

Only, he played like shit and managed to NOT break that record, but threw 4 picks to set the all time interceptions record instead. Essentially, they crapped the bed on the big national TV stage and got spanked 69-3. It was treeee-mendous.

Anyway, the amount of Bronco coverage in this thing is probably going to spike here over the next few months… So, if you don’t like that stuff, you don’t have to read it.

But its football season and cool outside.

Absolute heaven.

Since 1997, there has been a college football bowl game in Boise Idaho at Boise State University’s Bronco Stadium. It has turned into a neat local event, even when the Broncos aren’t playing in it.

Over the years, the bowl’s name has changed, as different title sponsors have ponied up the cash to be involved. Early on, it was just the Humanitarian Bowl (connected to the World Sports Humanitarian Hall of Fame, also here in Boise). Then, both Crucial.com and MPC Computers took shots at titleship.

MPC Computers decided to drop out after last year, so the bowl game has been searching for a new title sponsor.

Well, today it was announced who stepped up. And it is as bad as it could possibly be.

Continue reading “You’re calling it the WHAT bowl?”

I know its April and 3 months since the gloriousness that was the Fiesta Bowl, but since today is the Blue and Orange game, I thought I might wrap up a few random thoughts I’ve had in my head since the bowl.

First and foremost, this is an amazing time for me. Seeing Boise State mentioned all over, in every news outlet, every website, every sports fan was talking about my favorite team, all at the same time. And it lasted for a month solid. Hell it is still going.

This is difficult to explain to a lot of sports fans. Anyone that is a die hard fan of any pro team or major college team just can’t understand what this is like. They are used to seeing references to their teams everywhere. Those teams are included in every season preview. Those teams are covered in every news outlet. You will see them on every SportsCenter.

But growing up a Boise State fan, or of any smaller school for that mater, is a different deal. I was the guy 15 years ago who would rush home from an amazing game hoping to see the Boise State score on the ESPN “crawl” of scores that the bottom of the screen. I would see that and get a jolt of excitement. We were on the map! Granted, no one else in the country gave a damn about a Boise State vs. Weber State score, but dammit, we were included.

Fast forward to now. Being at the game, you didn’t get a feeling for how huge it really is. You didn’t have access to all the talking heads discussing your team. Praising your team. Comparing this game to the greatest football games of all time. By the time we made it back to the hotel and turned on ESPN, we had missed all the college specific stuff, but Boise State was a big part of SportsCenter that night. I knew it was a huge deal when in the airport the next morning ABC World News did 40 seconds on the game and of couse, the proposal. Wow.

Then, all the resulting hullabaloo was just icing on the cake.

Boise State has a seat at the table now. For example, a few weeks ago, USA Today published their college football recruiting round up. Boise State was one of the 15 teams they talked about. I’ve had to totally change the way I search for BSU info now. It used to be, you could pretty much avoid any national publications/broadcasts simply because they wouldn’t talk about you EVER. You had local coverage, and that was it. Six or seven years ago, FoxSports.com used to rank all D-1 football teams 1-115. I read that list religiously every Monday, checking to see the Broncos move from 67th to 64th or something. Or getting pissed if we dropped 2 spots after a win. I know full well, they spent a total of about 30 seconds ranking those bottom teams, but dammit it meant something to me!

But now, ESPN, USA Today, New York Times, Sports Illustrated, Fox, ABC, you name it, they are talking Broncos. When I stop to think about it, it blows my mind.

Just today, the Dan Patrick Show on ESPN Radio spent time talking about the story about Ian & Chrissy’s wedding and how the NCAA is monitoring gifts the couple might get. (The same story was on SportsCenter yesterday).

I’ve heard and read a lot of discussion about college football finally getting a playoff system. Lots of people think that game shows why we need a playoff. Frankly, after thinking about it a lot, I’m in favor of the current system. I mean, suppose we won that huge game with OU, but the very next week we had to go play Florida. They would have kicked our heads in. Instead of ending the season on the immense high that we did, it would have ended in just another loss. The only advantage we had in the Fiesta Bowl was that OU was maybe a little overconfident, and our tremendous coaching staff had a full month to game plan. Both of those advantages would go out the window the next week. And we all saw how Florida made the wire to wire number 1 team in the country Ohio State look like a high school team. I’m ok with Boise State not getting a shot at the National Championship. We’ve only been D-1 for 10 years. Now, would I have turned the offer down? Of course not. But, so long as they give underdogs like us a shot at the big bowls, I say that is just fine with me.

I heard an interview with a kid the Broncos had recruited and signed before the bowl game, who lives in Florida. This kid said that his whole school was rooting for the Broncos in the game, and when we won, he got about 40 phone calls from friends and family congratulating him. He said a bunch of friends in his school bought Boise State gear and started wearing it around. Can you imagine that? Deep in the heart of SEC country, kids are wearing Boise State clothing?

Speaking of SEC, we never have to hear the word “Georgia” ever again. That loss 2 years ago undid about 10 years of work building this program. When the pundits would talk Boise State it was always, “Yeah, but look what happened at Georgia”. No more.

On my recent Oregon Coast trip, people recognized my BSU hat and mentioned the game. I’ve heard stories about people all over the country, and the world for that matter, having their Boise State clothing noticed and mentioned about. That was unimaginable just a few short years ago.

Jared Zabransky on the cover of EA Sports NCAA Football 2008 is huge. It’s something that not a lot of people who aren’t video gamers might not think about, but the amount of free advertising that gives the school is huge! I have last years which had Reggie Bush on the cover, and you see him and USC all over the place. This may describe just how much of a geek I am, but after the bowl was over, and we were driving to the hotel, in my head I honestly thought, “They need to put Z on the cover of the game!”… sad but true.

I’m so glad that game happened against Oklahoma. They are one of college footballs giants. OU, Michigan, USC, Georgia, Ohio State, Texas… those are the royalty. Oklahoma has SEVEN national championships. They were the Big 12 champs. This wasn’t a down and out Kansas State team. Or a bad Iowa State team that got lucky and made it to the bowl. This was the big dog. Makes the game that much sweeter.

I have watched the game dozens of times. When the end comes, and Z throws that interception, I have never been more conflicted about a play in my life. When it happened, I thought the world was going to end. Game over for sure. I hate interceptions anyway, but that one was the worst of all time. Yet, without it, we would have never had the finish we did. Just an odd juxtaposition it puts me in.

This is getting a little long, but I will end it with this.

I used to have this discussion with people… If you could go back in time for any sporting event to view in person, but not have any knowledge of how the game would turn out (like you were watching it live) which game would you choose? My answer was always easy. The 1980 US Olympic Hockey Team Miracle on Ice vs. the USSR. Now, while I still feel that would be a huge one to be at, I have realized that my answer has finally changed. I would choose the 2007 Fiesta Bowl. The amazing thing is, I WAS ACTUALLY AT THAT GAME. I can think of nothing better than being in that place at that time with 30,000 fellow orange clad Bronco fans cheering our guts out for 3 hours. Sometimes I still can’t believe it actually happened.

I will take that memory with me to my grave. And cherish it every single day.

Sorry Jess… but I gotta do it… Stop reading now.

I have a question. More of an observation I suppose, but indulge me.

Last night I went to the Boise State vs. University of Idaho basketball game. It was pretty much a ‘game’ in name only. Idaho actually led 19-14 with just over 10 minutes left in the first half. Boise State then went on a 46 to 6 run lasting the rest of the first half and the first 6 minutes of the second half. And that was with Boise State missing 16 of their first 21 shots. This game could have been 108 to 40, but we ended with a final of 86-63.

That makes it twelve consecutive wins for Boise State basketball over the U of I. Their last win in the series was in 2001. In this time, it is safe to say that BSU has not been exactly lighting the basketball world on fire either. We have been a .500 team just about the whole time. But we still always seem to beat Idaho. Even the womens team (who also played Idaho last night) won 70-40.

I haven’t even gotten into football yet… the sport that really matters. There, Idaho has not beaten Boise State since winning by 1 in overtime in 1998, a string of 8 straight games. Some of those games include scores of 66-24, 64-7, and 70-35.

There are multiple classes of athletes who have come to BSU, played and graduated without ever losing to Idaho.

Granted, I lived through “The Streak” of 12 straight wins by Idaho in the 80’s & 90’s. Back then, that was a rivalry. Easily without question the biggest game every year was the Idaho game. Bar none, end of discussion. I remember being young and seeing ESPN or someone detailing the biggest rivalries in the country and listing Ohio State v. Michigan or Alabama v. Auburn. I could never understand how Boise State v. Idaho didn’t get into those lists! I mean, how could there be a bigger rivalry? Not in the mind of a 14 year old kid.

Now? Now you’ve got a 3-19 Idaho basketball team playing a .500 Bronco team in front of 4,000 fans. Ho-hum. There is still some venom left in the football meetings, but many of the newcomers to Boise in the past 10 years couldn’t give two shits about the Idaho game. They get geared up for Fresno or Hawaii.

Basically, what I’m wondering is can such a one sided series continue to be a rivalry? I mean, you can’t call “hammer vs. nail” a rivalry now can you? When one side always wins, the rivalry dies.

Now, would I trade some of the wins to get the rivalry back? Of course not. I could go on beating them every year for the rest of my life and I would be a very happy man. When Erickson came back, I was thinking that in a couple years, we could have a rivalry again! Well, he bailed out 10 months later and now who knows if it will ever come back.

Sorry Vandies… I long for the days when there was passion between us.