JUST THREE YEARS AGO, the Western Athletic Conference was on an all-time high. If you had a bowl game, the WAC had your team. The conference placed representatives in the Copper (Utah), Aloha (BYU), Holiday (Hawaii), Freedom (Fresno State) and Liberty (Air Force) bowls.
Like those giant electronics stores, the WAC was springing up everywhere you turned.But when this year's bowl bids came out at the end of last month, the WAC came away feeling like O.J. Simpson: persona non grata. Nobody wanted to be seen courting a WAC team. There was the guaranteed Holiday Bowl invitation for Colorado State - the co-WAC champion and tiebreaker winner - and Air Force's expected invitation to the Copper Bowl. But the rest of the league, including Utah and BYU, which were also co-champs, will be spending the holidays in front of the TV set.
That realization was dismaying news to fans in Utah, but also to the WAC office. All things considered, WAC commissioner Karl Benson would just as soon be traveling during the holidays. Instead, his official bowl appearances will be limited to two.
The dearth of opportunities is due to the jostling for guaranteed berths. In recent years, the bowl picture became so unstable that virtually all the bowls signed guaranteed agreements with conferences.
It isn't as though the WAC hasn't tried. Fourteen months ago, when the bowls were aligning themselves for the 1995 games, Benson attempted to negotiate a deal guaranteeing the No. 2 WAC team going to the Sun Bowl in El Paso, a WAC city. The Sun Bowl declined, preferring instead to strike a deal for the No. 3 team from the Pac-10. Undaunted, Benson offered the WAC's No. 3 team to the Aloha Bowl in Honolulu, also a WAC city. But the bowl said aloha to the WAC and chose the Pac-10's No. 4 finisher. The WAC shopped its No. 3 team to the Independence Bowl, but that went over like a roach in a punchbowl. The Independence instead went with the Southeastern Conference's No. 5 team.
"So," said Benson, "we came out on the short end."
Though the WAC has never been confused as a powerhouse football conference, it isn't like it hasn't had good years. As recently as last year, Utah, BYU and Colorado State received bowl invitations. But because most WAC teams don't have widespread national followings, they are low on the wish-list of most bowls. The Freedom Bowl, which invited WAC teams in 1986 (BYU), 1987 (Air Force), 1988 (BYU), 1990 (Colorado State), 1991 (San Diego State), 1992 (Fresno State), 1993 (Utah) and 1994 (Utah), went out of business. Other low-payout bowls - the type which might take a chance on a WAC co-champion or runner-up - apparently feel they can draw better with teams closer to their region. Thus, the Independence Bowl ended up with Michigan State and Louisiana State this year. The Liberty Bowl invited the Pac-10's Stanford - a team with strong national identity - rather than a WAC team, to play East Carolina.
To the WAC's consternation, the situation isn't likely to change anytime soon. Current bowl alignments are 3-year agreements with 3-year options, which means things may not change for six years.
"It's pretty disheartening," said Benson.
Optimists could say that with the WAC adding TCU, Rice, Southern Methodist and Tulsa next year, the league may have a more drawing power farther East. But none of the aforementioned teams raised any interest among the bowls this year. Also, with the new 16-team WAC, that means there will be six more WAC teams competing for the same two bowl spots.
The erstwhile Freedom Bowl continues to promise a return, though one can only wonder how long that would last. Talk of a bowl game in Auckland, New Zealand, called the Haka Bowl (named after a New Zealand warrior) is stirring. That bowl is looking at the possibility of a WAC or Pac-10 team being the anchor.
The Las Vegas Bowl - probably last among the bowls - is in its final year of its Mid-America Conference/Big West alignment. The WAC is hoping that bowl will be interested in taking a runner-up WAC team.
But right now those are only wishes. "Unfortunately," said Benson, "we could be in the same position a year from now, with only two teams being guaranteed bowl spots."
So the WAC is back where it started a few years ago, just hoping to get invited somewhere. Its days of storming the bowl games are over. Now the only sure way a WAC team can be assured of spending the holidays at a bowl game is to win the conference outright. Either that or buy tickets.