The wacky afterthought conference

Sporting News, The, Dec 9, 1996 by Carl C. Perkins

Sullivan and Tollner have a point. The WAC features top-flight skill-position players in BYU quarterback Steve Sarkisian, Air Force quarterback Beau Morgan, San Diego State wide receiver Will Blackwell, Utah running back Chris Fuamatu-Ma'afala and Wyoming receiver Marcus Harris. Earlier this season, one WAC coach suggested a major difference among the WAC and other leagues is that the WAC puts its best players on offense rather than defense. Although coaches differ on that theory, Benson seems to like it.

"The WAC has always been known for a lot of scoring and very little defense," he says. "I don't think there's anything wrong with that."

At the same time, he admits that philosophy sometimes works against his league: "(Fans) think scores are inflated, and they look at a BYU score and say, 'That's just the no-defense WAC.'"

A by-product of the offense-first image may be lower rankings. Benson maintains that it's difficult for WAC teams to move into the rankings, and that after a loss, WAC teams fall out of the polls more quickly than teams from other leagues. At one point this year, the WAC had three ranked teams: BYU, Utah and Wyoming. Utah fell out after a loss--but it was a 51-10 drubbing at Rice.

Tollner says all this is used against the WAC in recruiting: "I know that other schools say, 'Come here and you win six or seven games and you've got bowl opportunities. You go to that other conference and you've got a Wyoming sitting there with 10 wins and you've got no guarantees.'"

Case in point: California (6-5) lost five of its last six games this season but is going to the Aloha Bowl; Utah (8-3) lost two of its last three and is staying home. That routine is getting old for Utes coach Ron McBride, whose 7-4 team stayed home last season. "This is the second year in a row we don't get to go. There's no justice to it," he says.

Further dragging down the league are losses by some of its top teams to some of its weakest teams. In a nine-day span, San Diego State ended the nation's longest winning streak at 12 games when it knocked off Wyoming, 28-24, then ended the nation's longest losing streak at 12 games when it fell to UNLV, 44-42.

Critics and coaches agree that WAC teams play exciting football. They point to nationally televised games such as BYU-Texas A&M (4137), Colorado State-Air Force (42-41), San Diego State-Wyoming and Wyoming-Colorado State (25-24) as proof. And they point to Air Force upsetting Notre Dame, Tulsa upsetting Iowa and Utah upsetting Kansas as testaments to the caliber of football in the WAC.

"You look at some of the major conferences and there are some very good upper-echelon football teams that everybody hears about and knows about, and that really creates some strong images for the conference," Lubick says.

"In the WAC, our upper-echelon team would be BYU, and there's no question what they've done for themselves and the conference. You look at the bottom end of the conference and that's probably where people judge. Somewhere in between lies the truth."