Matchup could include Big Ten school

Steve Guiremand

Wednesday, Nov. 15, 2000 | 10:07 a.m.

There probably isn't a bigger or more exciting day of games in college football than Rivalry Weekend this Saturday.

Florida vs. Florida State. Michigan vs. Ohio State. USC vs. UCLA. Auburn vs. Alabama. Heck, even Oregon at Oregon State.

But the folks from the Las Vegas Bowl will be intently watching the outcomes of a few lesser Big Ten matchups with their fingers crossed.

Games such as Michigan State at Penn State, Illinois at Northwestern and Iowa at Minnesota.

Michigan State, Illinois and Minnesota can all hit the magic six-win mark necessary for an NCAA bowl game berth with victories. And if they do, a couple of those Big Ten schools might be available to fill an at-large berth in the Dec. 21 Las Vegas Bowl against a Mountain West team, most likely either Air Force or UNLV.

The Big Ten is locked into six bowl games. Five of those spots are already taken by Purdue, Michigan, Ohio State, Wisconsin and Northwestern. That means there could be as many as two Big Ten teams looking for at-large bowl bids by the end of Saturday if the Spartans, Illini and Gophers pick up wins.

The 14-person Las Vegas Bowl committee held a meeting Tuesday night to help map its strategy for the coming few weeks.

"There wasn't anything really exciting to come out of it," said Tina Kunzer-Murphy, director of the Las Vegas Bowl. "We're going to watch the results of the games this weekend and then get a better idea of where we can go. We still have a lot of work ahead of us."

A second-tier Big Ten, SEC or Big 12 school that travels well would probably make the ideal choice for the Las Vegas Bowl. The WAC, which would like to place the Cinderella UTEP Miners in a bowl game, as well as Toledo of the MAC, have also been in touch.

One conference that also seemed like a strong possibility a few weeks ago, the Pac-10, has notified Las Vegas Bowl officials this week they likely won't have an extra bowl-eligible team available.

"There's no one particular team that we're zeroing in on at this point," Kunzer-Murphy said. "It's really pretty early yet. We need to see how things play out, especially this weekend."

It could take even longer for the Las Vegas Bowl, which has second choice of Mountain West teams, to make a decision on which school to take from that conference.

Right now the MWC only has two bowl-eligible teams -- Colorado State (8-2, 5-1) and Air Force (7-3, 4-2). However, hometown favorite UNLV (5-5, 3-3) could still get there if it wins its final two games at San Diego State (Nov. 25) and Hawaii (Dec. 2).

"This thing could play out until Dec. 4," Kunzer-Murphy said. "I think it would be foolish not to wait and see what happens (with UNLV)."

One big reason for that is the NCAA has warned the Las Vegas Bowl to improve local ticket sales or risk being decertified in the future. The bowl sold only about 5,000 local tickets a year ago when Utah edged Fresno State, 17-16.

However, waiting for the Rebels leaves Air Force in limbo. The Mountain West's third team goes to the new Silicon Valley Classic in San Jose, Calif., Dec. 31 to play a WAC team, most likely San Jose State or UTEP.

"It's certainly (the Las Vegas Bowl's) prerogative (to wait)," Mountain West commissioner Craig Thompson said during the league's conference call on Tuesday. "If they are inclined to take Air Force, it might be better to get them early so they can start selling tickets. But I respect their position to wait on UNLV.

"Air Force would put people in the hotel rooms, which I think would be important to the LVCVA. ... I don't get involved with trying to tell them which team to take. It's like brother vs. brother. I'm just hoping to have three teams qualified at the end."