Friday, Nov. 29, 2002 | 10:42 a.m.
Steve Guiremand covers college football for the Sun. He can be reached at [email protected] or (702) 259-2324.
With apologies to those folks who used to love the anticipation of finding out whether Ball State or Central Michigan would play in the Las Vegas Bowl, the best thing that has happened to the Christmas Day contest is the bowl's recent tie-in with the Pac-10 Conference.
So what if the Las Vegas Bowl gets only the fifth pick of Pac-10 teams. So far, that's been more than good enough.
Last year USC brought some much needed tradition and prestige to the game, not to mention the possible 2002 Heisman Trophy winner in quarterback Carson Palmer. If Palmer has another big game Saturday against Notre Dame, he'll get my first-place vote for a remarkable senior season that started with even some hardcore Trojan fans I know questioning whether he was smart enough to play the position.
This year the Pac-10 will once again save the day for the Las Vegas Bowl, which is stuck taking the second-best team from a mediocre Mountain West Conference. Hopefully that will be Air Force, which besides being a classy outfit, has one of the most exciting players in college football in quarterback Chance Harridge.
Depnding on what happens the final two weeks of the regular season, it looks like the Las Vegas Bowl will wind up with another team with a strong college football tradition -- the Washington Huskies. Or, if they get their wish, the Oregon State Beavers and star running back Steven Jackson from Eldorado High.
Washington vs. Air Force? Now there's a game worth putting Christmas dinner off for a few hours.
Talk about your contrast in styles. Washington's high-powered passing attack, featuring one of the nation's top wide receivers in Reggie Williams, against Air Force's precision-like option ground attack. Slicky Rick Neuheisel vs. Fisher "Dadgummit" DeBerry. Harridge vs. Cody Pickett, two junior quarterbacks who could be contending for the 2003 Heisman Trophy.
The Huskies are a hot team, having defeated Oregon State, Oregon and mighty Washington State the final three weeks of the season to finish with a respectable 7-5 record. And Washington would apparently love to spend Christmas in Las Vegas.
"Let's go to Vegas," Pickett told the Seattle Times after the Huskies' triple overtime 29-26 upset of Washington State last Saturday in Pullman. "That sounds cool."
The Huskies are tied with Oregon State for fifth place in the Pac-10. Barring a UCLA upset of Washington State next week, the Cougars will go to the Rose Bowl to play Iowa.
The Holiday Bowl gets second pick of Pac-10 teams and will likely take USC if the Trojans aren't snapped up by the BCS with a win over Notre Dame. The Sun Bowl gets third pick and is leaning heavily to Arizona State providing the Sun Devils don't slip up today against Arizona.
That leaves Washington and Oregon State for the Insight.com Bowl in Phoenix and the Las Vegas Bowl.
Although Las Vegas Bowl officials would love to bring in Dennis Erickson's Beavers, the folks in Phoenix won't let them slip by. Reason? They remember the 2000 Fiesta Bowl (sorry Irish fans) and the 38,000 Oregon State fans who took over the Valley of the Sun that week.
Ca-ching!
"Our people travel," Oregon State athletic director Bob De Carolis said. "They go to hotels. They'll spend money. We've got some documented history there."
Which unfortunately is why the Beavers won't be around for the Las Vegas Bowl to pick. In fact, if USC does get a BCS bid -- I'm betting Notre Dame gets a BCS bid even with a loss to SC on Saturday -- and Washington State goes to the Rose Bowl as expected, it wouldn't be surprising to see Oregon State spending the holidays in San Diego.
So here's hoping for a Purple Christmas in Las Vegas.
Once around the Mountain West
AIR FORCE: Falcon quarterback Chance Harridge, whose next game will likely be Christmas Day in the Las Vegas Bowl, has set an NCAA record for rushing touchdowns by a quarterback. His 22 TDs breaks the record of 20 set by Navy's Chris McCoy in 1997. Harridge needs just 29 passing yards in the bowl game to become the 16th player in NCAA history to both rush and pass for 1,000 yards in a season. He is second in the MWC in rushing with 1,159 yards.
BYU: The Cougars, who entered the season with a 9-2 road record in Mountain West play, went 0-3 away from LaVell Edwards Stadium this season. BYU (5-7, 2-5) finished with its first sub-.500 record since 1973.
COLORADO STATE: The Rams' practice field is such a quagmire from melting snow that the team practiced Wednesday at Poudre School District Stadium, which has an artificial surface. CSU is 10-2 in November home games under Sonny Lubick.
NEW MEXICO: Freshman running back DonTrell Moore needs 59 rushing yards Saturday against Wyoming to reach 1,000 for the season and 123 yards to break Winslow Oliver's freshman rushing mark of 1,063 yards. Lobos coach Rocky Long said the school will petition the NCAA to try to get a rare sixth year of eligibility for fifth-year senior running back Quincy Wright, who suffered a season-ending knee injury in New Mexico's fourth game of the season against Baylor.
SAN DIEGO STATE: Senior wide receivers J.R. Tolver and Kassim Osgood rank second and third in the nation in receptions and have set an NCAA tandem receiving record with 213 catches for 2,928 yards. And the Aztecs (4-8) still have one game remaining next week at Hawaii.
UNLV: Colorado State is the only Mountain West school that Rebel head coach John Robinson has not defeated. Robinson defeated Utah in the 1993 Freedom Bowl while head coach at USC.
UTAH: Rumors pursist that USC offensive coordinator Norm Chow is near the top of the list of candidates to replace Ron McBride as head coach. Chow's wife and family still reside in the Salt Lake City area. Trojan coach Pete Carroll told the Los Angeles Daily News this week that he would not stop Chow from leaving if he's offered the job. "I'll never stand in the way of a guy moving up," Carroll said. "I think he's a likely candidate and a great candidate."
WYOMING: Vic Koenning will try to double his three-year Mountain West Conference win total with an upset of New Mexico on Saturday. The Cowboys are 1-19 in MWC play under Koenning, who was fired two weeks ago but will coach Wyoming's final game of the season. "These players never quit on me," Koenning said when asked why he stuck around two weeks to coach the final game. "We've come a long way, and I didn't want the perception of our players to be that I quit on them."01
archive
