Columnist Ron Kantowski: LV Bowl alive and kicking … for now

Thursday, Aug. 21, 1997 | 9:32 a.m.

PROVIDED THE game itself is more organized than the luncheon called to announce it (which started 25 minutes late Wednesday), the latest reinvention of the California/Raisin/California Raisin/Las Vegas Bowl is the best one yet.

This latest face lift eradicates a couple of warts known as the Big West and Mid-American conferences, whose champions have combined to bring five of the most entertaining football games to Sam Boyd Stadium that nobody ever saw.

Big West kingpin Nevada-Reno plays a brand of wide-open football the Western Athletic Conference has become known for and has a following UNLV only lusts about.

But every other year, under the prior format, Wolf Pack faithful almost had to plan two trips to Las Vegas (regular season vs. UNLV and Las Vegas Bowl). Last year, many didn't make it back in December.

And one of these years maybe, just maybe, UNR is going to slip, which might have left the Las Vegas Bowl with an Idaho vs. Toledo or North Texas vs. Marshall matchup. Slim Pickens could have played the National Anthem.

No connoisseur of banjo music (and mindful of the Las Vegas-based WAC championship game which was threatening to exterminate it), the LV Bowl took a proactive approach to improving its visibility and viability. It dumped the previous conference tie-ins and picked up a corporate sponsor (Reno Air) that will make the game an $800,000 prize for a WAC also-ran and a doable proposition for some 6-5 Big Ten (or other at-large) team.

Another positive step was bumping the game from Thursday night to Saturday afternoon. The Las Vegas Bowl VI brochure uses our city's "mild December weather" as a selling point but at night, "mild cold and flu weather" is more like it.

What the game will lose in TV sets by moving from Thursday night on ESPN to Saturday afternoon on ESPN2 it may gain at the box office.

But it remains to be seen if Las Vegas will support two college football games of similar magnitude in a two-week period.

Last year's inaugural WAC title game featuring Brigham Young and Wyoming was an unqualified success and a complete sellout. (Curiously, it also provided much of the backdrop for a Las Vegas Bowl highlight film the Visitors and Convention Authority used in its NCAA certification presentation.)

But if LVCVA marketing chief Rossi Ralenkotter is sincere about seeing it through from Las Vegas Bowl I to Las Vegas Bowl L (as he suggested Wednesday), then he might want to consider bestowing the WAC title game with a lovely parting gift.

Neither the LVCVA nor WAC should be misled that every WAC title game will fill Sam Boyd Stadium like last year's. Without a dynamite matchup, the WAC might be better off to stage its championship contest on the campus of its best team.

Think about it: Would the the Rose Bowl still be considered the Granddaddy of the Bowl Games if the Pac-10 decided its championship there two weeks before?