In a move that shocked nobody, Las Vegas bowl officials extended a formal invitation to the Oregon Ducks yesterday. BYU now has an opponent on which to fix their intense scrutiny and effort for the next three weeks plus.

Cougar fans should be ecstatic for a number of reasons, which I will enumerate here.

First, the Ducks are the highest quality opponent from the group of 4th place candidates. UCLA is a decent team (and it would have been fun to dismantle a team that creamed Utah), but they have been to the Vegas Bowl way too many times now. They also lost to Oregon head-to-head this year. Arizona State has a lame-duck coach (meaning he has been fired and is finishing out the year, for those who didn’t know) and lost big-time to Oregon in Tempe. Arizona would have been compelling for BYU fans, but nobody else. Besides, BYU would turn around and play Arizona in the home opener next year. A little too much Wildcat in too short a span.

Oregon has a high national profile despite losing three straight games to finish the season. They present an interesting challenge to BYU’s defense, as Oregon is loaded with talent and speed. It will be exciting to see if the BYU defense can recoup physically and mentally from being roughed up by Utah.

Second, a win over Oregon in the Vegas Bowl will help BYU immensely in the head-to-head recruiting battle that is taking place and will likely come to a head in January. Several talented recruits have both schools in their top five. Nothing says “we’re a better program” than beating them on the field.

Lastly, this is a chance to purge the last remnants of Crowton’s Era of Failure. Beating Utah helped a lot of players put Crowton’s mismanagement of their early college careers behind them. This is a chance to nail that coffin shut and bury it.

Obviously, this angle is the red hot one for the media and they’ll beat it to death in the coming month. Don’t let the media’s dilution of it mask the fact that it is a very important game for the program. It’s not about the fans being able to get revenge and say, “See, you really were a bad coach!” (Well, to each fan his own, I guess. I admit harboring some resentment and anxiety to see ol’ Crowton get his tail handed to him.) More importantly, the BYU players will be able to collectively confront the ghost hanging over the program these past two years and put it all to rest. A win would be extremely therapeutic for all of Cougar Nation, starting with the players.

One final note - it’ll be nice to see BYU take the field in their home unis this year instead of the whites. With a hugely pro-BYU crowd at their backs and graced in blue jerseys, the Cougars should have a significant home-field advantage over the already shell-shocked Ducks. There’s a good chance that the Cougs will run their streak to 10 games and enjoy a fluffy and fuzzy break until spring ball.

It turns out that the five bonus points ear-marked for the weekly winner went to a player who doesn’t participate in the overall standings. FootballChallenged beat us all with a base score of 22.5 and 27.5 with the bonus added. FC’s football prowess appears to be growing by leaps and bounds (I’m proud!).

2^nd Half Standings
Shirts: 123(15.5)
goldenspidey: 121.5(15)
hornplayer: 115.5(17)
bsum1: 112(10)
Nwhaught: 112(11.5)
golfingpirate: 100.5(17)

Overall Standings
Shirts: 232.5
goldenspidey: 231
bsum1: 216
hornplayer: 215
golfingpirate: 196

OK, apparently some people missed the memo that we’re adding the bowl game to the end of the contest. That post will go up sometime in the middle of December. Stay tuned…

The similarities were unmistakable. The Cougars jumped out to an early lead and appeared to be cruising. The Utes climbed back in by making some critical plays and appeared to have the victory sealed with a late touchdown. It seemed like Utah’s stranglehold on the rivalry would continue.

Channeling the magic of that unforgettable game in 2000, John Beck engineered a determined drive of 75 yards that culminated in a miraculous touchdown, ripping the hearts out of the Utes and their fans. BYU players and fans celebrated wildly as the Utes exited in the background.

Yes, the 2006 Wasatch War (my new name for the rivalry game - sounds a lot better than that disgrace of a name drummed up by the media) seemed to be liberally sprinkled with some of the magic of 2000. Even John Beck acknowledged that it felt like the BYU magic has returned. I’m inclined to agree.

Give the Utes credit, though. They played their absolute best game of the season and nearly pulled off the huge upset. As the momentum of the game shifted, the Utes could seemingly do no wrong. Every play call was the right one. The Cougar defense, usually stout and stingy, became uncharacteristically porous, with much of the credit going to Utah’s excellent in-game adjustments and execution.

Granted, BYU suffered some key injuries in the secondary. Ben Criddle came up gimpy in the second quarter with turf toe and had to be heavily taped. Kayle Buchanan, subbing for an already-injured Justin Robinson, broke his leg in the second half. Robinson came into the game nursing a bad Achilles tendon and a separated shoulder which he appeared to reaggravate during the game. Nevertheless, the Utes took advantage of the opportunities and raced to a ten point lead which appeared pretty solid at the time.

We all know how the game ended (take a moment to celebrate it in your mind again). We’ve all read the quotes and heard the call from every radio and TV station covering the game (take a moment and replay them in your head). Let’s all enjoy this one and not let any whining Utes bring us down.

Game Balls

1. John Beck: I loved Coach Mendenhall’s sentiment about Beck’s game-winning drive, that Beck’s critics now “have no voice”. Beck has done everything that any Cougar quarterback could be asked to do. He’s won a conference championship (winning 9 straight games in the process), beat Utah, lead BYU to a national ranking and a bowl berth. It’s time everybody either acknowledged that Beck truly is one of the greats or shut up.
2. Johnny Harline & Dan Coats: two of the best tight ends in BYU history had one of the best games by a tight end duo in Cougar history. All four of Beck’s touchdown passes went to these two (three to Harline).
3. Bryce Mahuika: filling Nate Meikle’s shoes on a week’s notice was a tall order, but Mahuika stepped up with a few good catches, including a huge first down on the final drive. Mahuika had to elude a tackler to get the first down and stop the clock or Beck wouldn’t have even had a chance to win the game on the last play.

Legionnaires, sound off with your thoughts on one of the greatest games in BYU history.

Let’s begin with the obsession. The obsession of knowing what is going on with the game 24 hours a day, seven days a week: the players, the teams (those he roots for as well as those he doesn’t), he must read about or watch them all. I can’t flip through the channels without being asked to stop just so he can see what the score is or who’s playing. It doesn’t seem to matter if it is a rerun or live. Shouldn’t there be a day of rest from it all? A day of no football talk, no waiting on your man to leave the house because he has to check last night’s scores “real quick”, no sports at all?

Then there are the bowl games. Our first major blow out came because of a bowl game[editor's note: It was the Utah game, not the bowl game]. {My note: I hate rivalry games even more.} My first thoughts of “oh crap, what am I getting myself into and do I really want to?” came that day. How was I to know running errands for my mother during half time wasn’t acceptable? How was I to know we’d cut a few minutes into the second half? It’s four hours long, we missed only a few measly minutes. How was I to know that a man’s temper is colossal when it comes to anyone interfering with his precious football? You aren’t missing anything except announcers talking about the game YOU just watched. You know what went down. You know who is sucking it up and who is rockin’ the house. Why do you need to hear someone else repeat the obvious?

Talk radio, that one I get to some degree. I myself find it somewhat interesting and get a laugh out of it now and again however, every time we ride in the car? I don’t need to know about the time some quarterback clear back in 1914 scored the winning touchdown, I like to live in the now. The Stone Age doesn’t appeal to me. (If anyone reading this is that old, sorry, no offense.) I enjoy the times when a DJ he doesn’t like comes on so he turns on some tunes or turns the radio completely off. Hey, if I was into listening to Radio Disney, Dr. What’s Her Face on AM, or Christmas music all year long you’d get sick of it too.

Four quarters, really? Why not two shorter halves like basketball? Two hours sounds fulfilling enough to me. I do enjoy that they have cut back somewhat so the games are only three plus hours instead of four, but geez, who has the time? I’d like some of my Saturdays back! Football every week? Seriously? So what you are telling me is that for seven months of the year I have to work five days of the week and then I still don’t get my husband on my day off? And you want me to love football? I could learn how to love a red hot poker stuck to my leg if it would give me something in return and not take up my husband’s time. The flesh smell might get to me, but hey, I have him.

Okay, now that my blood pressure is bubbling over I think I’ll stop and save the rest for next week. For those of you now thinking, “wow, she is really a hater” it isn’t completely true. Slowly but surely I am accepting the inevitable and enjoying the ride to some degree. I even cried over BYU football when I heard we didn’t get our tickets to the Vegas Bowl (keep in mind I am pregnant- we did get tickets after all as well). I think it was mostly the thought of my husband being upset or me being at home while he went on a fun road trip but a tinge of disappointment did strike me. What can I say; I’ve grown quite fond of Fui, Beck, Tonga, and most of all Curtis Brown. I’m a softy.

OK, folks! This is the big one! Due to the degree of difficulty in picking an accurate score in the rivalry game, I’m going to make it interesting by awarding 5 extra points to this week’s winner. I’ve also decided to add the bowl game to the slate, so the field is still relatively wide open. Anyone could get hot and pull off the win!

BYU @ Utah
(BYU favored by 10.5)