In recent years the Deseret News has run several stories about the University of Utah's lengthy and baffling mediocrity on the football field. The subject came up again this week in Tucson, as Utah prepared for today's Copper Bowl.
"All the time I've been at Utah I thought the same thing: Why hasn't this program been good?" Utah coach Ron McBride told the Arizona Daily Star. "It has all the resources to be in a bowl game almost every year . . . Utah's never been identified with football, and I don't like that."Since joining the Western Athletic Conference 31 years ago, the Utes have managed just 12 winning seasons. It has been 28 years since they last appeared in a bowl game.
It's a strange performance from a school that has an enrollment of 26,000 students, a hometown city of one-million plus, and resources superior to or equal to its WAC rivals. Recruiting to Utah is not like recruiting to, say, Laramie, and Wyoming has claimed several championships and bowl games.
No wonder McBride has continually referred to the Copper Bowl as a "huge" game for the Utes. He is anxious to establish Utah as a nationally recognized football program, and the best way to do that, he reasons, is to fill the stands and make a good showing on the field today.
"This is huge for us," says McBride. "I mean it. Huge. Do you realize how long 28 years is between bowl games?"
Let's put it this way: If the Utes wait another 28 years, they won't appear in a bowl game again until the year 2020.
McBride is nothing if not a determined, gung-ho coach. "Winning the WAC is not a daydream," he says. "It's going to be a fact. To me, Utah is THE job. I have a real passion for it. We're going to be consistently good year in and year out. That's all I think about."
MISCELLANEOUS NOTES: As head coaches, both Mike Price of Washington State and Ron McBride of Utah have had remarkably similar results. Both have won exactly half of their games. Price has a career record of 67-67, McBride 17-17 . . . A month ago it appeared that BYU, not Utah, would play in the Copper Bowl, so the Cougars arranged for an alumni party for 1,500 on the University of Arizona campus. When the Utes wound up with the Copper Bowl berth, they not only assumed BYU's alumni party, but they increased the size of it to 3,000 . . . In an effort to sell tickets to Ute fans, Utah officials have advertised sunny, warm Arizona as an escape from the Utah winter. It hasn't quite turned out that way. Temperatures have been cool rather than warm - in the 60s during the day - and a cold rain fell all day Monday. Indeed, the Arizona Stadium field was so soaked that Utah had to move its final practice elsewhere. More rain is expected today . . . Some 6,000 Washington State students have bought tickets for the game. Many of them drove - 32 hours by bus, 27 hours by car, they say . . . .