This has been a season of second chances for New Mexico backup quarterback Chris Nelson.
A week before the season started Nelson was arrested for driving drunk. He pleaded guilty to aggravated driving while intoxicated, issued a public apology and was allowed to rejoin the team a week later. Head coach Rocky Long made it clear though that if Nelson got into trouble again, he'd be gone.
"I made a mistake. I'm just looking for a second chance from a lot of people. I just want to move on," Nelson said at the time.
Move on he has, and Saturday Nelson will get his first start in a Division I game when the Lobos take on Utah. It's a game that's crucial to both teams' bowl hopes. The winner Saturday becomes bowl eligible.
Nelson has moved into the starting role because season-long starter Kole McKamey has a bad back.
"This is the first game I'm starting in division one football and I've got to go in there and act like it's the 30th game I've started," Nelson said this week.
San Diego State — with the exception of lopsided wins over both BYU and Utah — has had another tough season. The Aztecs are just 3-6 overall and 2-4 in league play entering Saturday's game against Colorado State. SDSU is also the only team in the league that has never been to a bowl game since the inception of the MWC.
What it a means is that head coach Tom Craft is under fire. Speculation is running rampant that he'll be fired at the end of the year. The school's athletic director, in a statement this week, backed Craft — for the time being.
"Tom Craft is our head football coach," SDSU athletic director Jeff Schemmel said in the prepared statement. "We have been, and will continue to be, focused on using our time and resources toward supporting Tom's, his coaches' and hit team's efforts to win our final three games and to finish the academic semester well."
There is an outside chance the Aztecs could finish with a .500 mark — since they play 12 games this season due to a season finale at Hawaii. Still, to do that the Aztecs would have to beat MWC powers Colorado State and TCU as well as Hawaii in Honolulu.
That statement from the A.D. supported Craft for the time being — but said nothing of the future.
Seven of the top 50 receivers in the nation are from the MWC. New Mexico's Hank Baskett leads the way at No. 8. He has 928 receiving yards on the year. Colorado State David Anderson is 10th in the nation, followed by Wyoming Jovon Bouknight (13), San Diego State's Jeff Webb (26), Air Force's Jason Brown (27), BYU's Jonny Harline and Utah's John Madsen (46).
Harline, meanwhile, is the second most productive tight end in the country. He has 706 yards — second-only to Tulsa's Garrett Mills (816).
TCU's wrapped up the outright conference championship with its victory over Colorado State on Saturday. It marks the Horned Frogs' first outright league title in nearly 50 years.
The previous time TCU won a league title by itself was in 1959, when it finished atop the Southwest Conference. The Horned Frogs have been nomads in recent years, leaving the now-defunct Southwest Conference for the bloated, 16-team WAC, then bolting to Conference USA and now to the MWC.
TCU has shared several titles since 1958. The Horned Frogs won a shared SWC title in 1959 and 1994 and won pieces of championships in the WAC in 1999 and 2000 and Conference USA 2002.
TCU — which has the fourth longest winning streak in the nation — is ranked No. 18 in the Bowl Championship Series Standings this week. It marks the 16th time the Horned Frogs have been ranked in the BCS Standings, the most of any school in a non-automatic BCS league. Boise State and Utah are tied for second with 12 weeks in the BCS standings.
Air Force's Fisher DeBerry is another coach getting plenty of criticism. The Falcons lost to both Navy and Army this season and are just 3-7 overall. Air Force will finish with a losing record in conseutive seasons for the first time in the DeBerry era — which began in '84 . . . BYU has held three opponents to 70 yards rushing or fewer this season, including UNLV, which had a grand total of two yards on the ground Saturday . . . New Mexico is coming off a bye — which is not good news for Utah. The Lobos are 8-0 following bye weeks under Rocky Long.