Bowled over on Christmas

Steve Guiremand

Tuesday, Aug. 21, 2001 | 10:30 a.m.

Do college football bowl games and Christmas mix?

It didn't work in Hawaii. Now Las Vegas gets its chance.

The Las Vegas Bowl announced on Monday that it will be moving its game to Christmas Day starting this year so that it can be broadcast nationally by ABC-TV.

Previously, ABC televised the Aloha Bowl on Christmas Day while ESPN broadcast its sister Oahu Bowl contest. But those games were shifted to the mainland this year after several dismal turnouts and will be played in Seattle and San Francisco.

However, ABC wanted to continue to televise a Christmas Day game. There was talk about moving one of the former Hawaii games to Anaheim Stadium for a Christmas date, but that idea was recently shot down by Anaheim city officials.

Enter the Las Vegas Bowl, which was more than happy to pick up the extra national exposure in trade for playing on Christmas Day. And the Pac-10, which originally had been locked in to ship its sixth-place team to Las Vegas, will now send its No. 5 team the next three years here for an $800,000 payday.

"It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas," joked Tina Kunzer-Murphy, the executive director of the Las Vegas Bowl. "Seriously, we think it's a great opportunity for the Las Vegas Bowl ... going to ABC and also moving up the ladder with the Pac-10."

But is Las Vegas ready to support a bowl game that kicks off at 12:30 on Christmas Day?

"We think it will be easier for families to go to the game now," Kunzer-Murphy said. "People have the holidays off. They can be home in time for dinner.

"We've always heard how tough it was for families to come when we would play at 6 p.m. on a Thursday before Christmas. A lot of time people were just getting off work, were tired from a long day, or were still getting ready for the holidays. With most people getting the day off, we think we have a better opportunity to capture local fans for the game."

No doubt the move to ABC is also a huge one for the third-year Mountain West Conference which can use all the national exposure it can get.

"The move to Christmas Day gives the Las Vegas Bowl tremendous television potential," Mountain West Commissioner Craig Thompson said. "This time slot offers a captive television audience and, traditionally, a very strong television rating. We welcome the added exposure the Mountain West Conference will receive with this move and look forward to playing against a Pac-10 opponent."

"I think it's good," UNLV football coach John Robinson, whose squad whipped Arkansas 31-14 in last year's Las Vegas Bowl, said. "It's fairly early in the day, so you can still go get some turkey around 4:30 or 5. I think it's a good move for the conference."

Kunzer-Murphy said the Las Vegas Bowl will work hard to have "reasonably priced tickets for the game. We need to do a better job on our local ticket sales."

An announcement on a title sponsor for the game could be made within the next two weeks according to Kunzer-Murphy.