AS FURTHER PROOF that time really does march on and things do change, Utah will play SMU today in the Cotton Bowl in a certified, 100 percent OFFICIAL WESTERN ATHLETIC CONFERENCE FOOTBALL GAME.
Wait a minute, S-M-U?Didn't they used to . . . Yeah, those guys.
File this under Things You Thought Would Never Happen In Your Lifetime, along with earrings for men, the possible reelection of Bill Clinton, Dennis Rodman and the fall of the Berlin Wall.
You never thought the old, tradition-heavy Southwest Conference would close its doors like some overnight video store, and that some of its teams would run off to join the WAC.
But that's what happened.
You don't think times have changed? The biggest game in Dallas today will pit Utah, a former ne'er-do-well that has grown into a Top 25 contender, against SMU, a former SWC powerhouse that has fallen on hard times and came to the WAC with its hand out.
SMU is one of three teams from Texas to join the WAC this year. The Big Eight Conference and the WAC both chose teams from the SWC, although it wasn't exactly an equal selection process. If it had gone down this way on a playground, they would have made them do it over again.
The Big Eight, one of college football's Big Kids and something of a bully, called dibs on the the first pick - and the second pick, third pick, fourth pick and so on until it grew into the Big 12. Then the WAC got its turn to pick. The WAC got the fat kid, the nerd and the truant - a.k.a. TCU, Rice and SMU.
Not exactly the creme de la creme of the league unless you're looking for future applicants to Oxford or a high BMW-to-student ratio.
Still, other than Rice (the UTEP of the SWC), TCU and SMU have enough tradition and past glory in the once-esteemed SWC that coming to the WAC must have been a little hard to take. These teams are old-football money. It's like Charles Emerson Winchester III joining the Elks Lodge.
But SMU coach Tom Rossley is a good sport. He's already getting into the swing of things. He sounded like a longtime WAC coach the other day when he was talking about the league.
"They're as strong as any other (conference)," he said, demonstrating a quick grasp of the old WAC party line. "There are some really good teams."
Of course, Rossley predates The Rise and Fall of SMU. He wasn't there when the Mustangs were a national power. He wasn't there when, during the four seasons from 1981 to 1984, their worst record was 10-2, and they boasted future NFL stars like Eric Dickerson and Craig James.
They were the best team money could buy - literally, as it turned out. That didn't sit well with the fun folks at the NCAA, which issued a death penalty sentence against SMU - no football in 1987 and '88.
In the seven years since then, only once have the Mustangs managed to win more than two games.
So here they are, living in the very town where the Big 12 is based, playing in the Western Athletic Conference.
The Mustangs used to look down their noses at the WAC; now they're looking up. To the old SWC, the WAC was a flag league. WAC teams didn't even run the ball like real men; they did that other thing, whaddya call it, passing?
The one time the Mustangs did play a WAC team they thought they deserved better. They played WAC champion BYU in the 1980 Holiday Bowl and wound up losing 46-45 after blowing a 20-point lead in the last four minutes.
The Mustangs thought their only mistake that night was to call off the dogs too early.
Who could have imagined that 16 years later they would join the WAC - and be glad about it?
SMU - the school that produced the likes of Dickerson, James, Forrest Gregg, Kyle Rote, Michael Carter, Doak Walker, Raymond Berry and Don Meredith - is starting over. This time they want to win the right way, but it isn't easy.
They averaged crowds of only 19,000 last season. Nobody's interested in watching bad college football, especially since a team called the Cowboys also is in the neighborhood. Maybe the students expect more for their $22,000 annual tuition. Kids nowadays! The only thing they give the Mustangs these days is a yawn.
In Texas, football observers still seem to consider a loss to a WAC team something extraordinary and difficult to understand. When BYU beat Texas A&M in the Pigskin Classic to start the season, the headline in the Dallas newspapers read "WAC'd".
As for the Mustangs, they're glad to be in the WAC, and if they're not they're keeping it to themselves. After all, the WAC is as strong as any other conference, you know. If you don't believe it, just ask Rossley.