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New Mexico Bowl Notes - Week 8
NEW MEXICO BOWL NOTES - WEEK 8
Week 8 New Mexico Bowl Notes in PDF Format
FIRST BCS RANKINGS OF 2009 RELEASED: The first Bowl Championship Series Standings were released on Sunday, Oct. 18 and the Mountain West has three teams in the Top 25 while the Western Athletic Conference has one. Boise State, of the WAC, is fourth, the highest a team from a non-automatic qualifying conference has ever been ranked. TCU leads all MWC teams at No. 8, while BYU is 16th and Utah is 18th. The MWC has had three teams ranked in the BCS Standings for nine consecutive weeks dating back to last season.
Boise State earns an automatic bid into one of the BCS bowls if it is the highest ranked non-BCS team in the top 12 of the BCS poll at the end of the regular season. Or, the Broncos could make a BCS bowl if they rank in the top 16 and are higher than conference champion that has an annual automatic berth. Prior to this year, the highest a WAC team had ever debuted in the initial BCS rankings was 12th last year, by Boise State. The previous highest BCS ranking at any point by a WAC team was seventh by Boise State during the 2004 season.
COLLEGE FOOTBALL GAMEDAY AT BYU: ESPN announced today its popular College Football GameDay show will be broadcast live from BYU this coming Saturday, Oct. 24, 2009. Provo will play host to both the radio and television ESPN College GameDay broadcasts. ESPN College GameDay Built by The Home Depot will begin broadcasting live on Saturday at 10 a.m. ET / 8 a.m. MT. College GameDay host Chris Fowler will be joined by ESPN analysts Lee Corso, Kirk Herbstreit and Desmond Howard for the live television broadcast.
ESPNU PICKS UP FRESNO STATE-NEW MEXICO STATE GAME: New Mexico State’s home game against Fresno State on Oct. 24 has been picked up by ESPNU and will kick off at 8:15 p.m. (MT). The game originally was scheduled to begin at 6:00. This is the first of four conference games (as stipulated in the WAC’s new ESPN contract) that will be selected by ESPNU over the upcoming months.
UTES ASSIST WITH PROJECT ONE HOPE: The University of Utah Student-Athlete Advisory Committee, the U. Alumni Association and the Polynesian Coaches Association are joining forces in support of “Project One Hope” at this Saturday’s Utah-Air Force football game. Members of each group will be stationed outside the stadium gates to collect donations for families affected by the recent earthquake and tsunami that devastated the islands of American Samoa, Samoa and Tonga. “Project One Hope” is of special interest to the Utah football team, which has 30 Polynesian players on its roster and five staff members.
BOWL PREDICTIONS: Some college football experts are already making their postseason predictions. Utah is selected the most from the Mountain West Conference while Fresno State was chosen the most from the WAC. Currently, Idaho is the only WAC team that is bowl eligible while BYU and TCU are both eligible from the MWC. Here is the complete breakdown of what is selected for the 2009 New Mexico Bowl:
CollegeBowlProjections.com: Fresno State (WAC) vs. Utah (MWC)
College Football News/Fox Sports: Fresno State (WAC) vs. Utah (MWC)
CBS Sportsline: Louisiana Tech (WAC) vs. Colorado State (MWC)
ESPN (Mark Schlabach’s pick): Fresno State (WAC) vs. Utah (MWC)
ESPN (Bruce Feldman’s pick): Louisiana Tech (WAC) vs. Colorado State (MWC)
Football-Bowl.com: Fresno State (WAC) vs. Wyoming (MWC)
Phil Steele (Operation Sports): Fresno State (WAC) vs. Utah (MWC)
Sports Illustrated: Utah State (WAC) vs. UNLV (MWC)
BOWL TICKETS ON SALE NOW: Tickets for the fourth annual New Mexico Bowl are on sale to the general public today. Prices remain the same as the first three bowl games, with Premium sideline seats available for $30 and North end zone seats for $23. Groups of 20 or more can purchase tickets for $25 each.
Fans have three convenient ways to purchase tickets. They are available online at www.newmexicobowl.com, at the UNM ticket office located on the Northwest corner of Avenida Cesar Chavez and University Boulevard, or by calling the Lobo Ticket Office at (505) 925-LOBO or the Bowl office at (505) 925-5999.
The game, featuring a representative from the Mountain West and Western Athletic Conferences, will be played on Saturday, Dec. 19 at 2:30 p.m. MT at University Stadium on the University of New Mexico campus and will be televised nationally on ESPN and ESPN-HD.
FOLLOW THE NEW MEXICO BOWL ON TWITTER: The New Mexico Bowl is now using Twitter to keep fans up-to-date with the latest information. By becoming a follower of our Twitter page, you will have the opportunity to receive breaking news, score updates, and special announcements. Twitter is a social networking and micro-blogging service that allows its users to send and read other users’ updates (known as tweets), which are text-based posts of up to 140 characters in length. Updates are displayed on the user’s profile page and can also be received on cell phones who have signed up to receive them. Sign up for a Twitter account, registration is free, at Twitter.com.
NEW MEXICO BOWL CONNECTIONS: There are currently 13 former Mountain West or Western Athletic Conference players who played in one of the three New Mexico Bowls and is on an NFL team roster. Colorado State leads the way with five, followed by four San Jose State Spartans, three New Mexico Lobos and one Fresno State Bulldog. Below is a complete list of the athletes:
Kyle Bell (2008, CSU) - RB, Jacksonville Jaguars
Quincy Black (2006, UNM) - LB, Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Tom Brandstater (2008, FS) - QB, Denver Broncos
Billy Farris (2008, CSU) - QB, Cincinnati Bengals
Jarron Gilbert (2006, SJSU) - DT, Chicago Bears
Tommie Hill (2008, CSU) - DE, New York Giants
Gartrell Johnson (2008, CSU) - RB, San Diego Chargers
James Jones (2006, SJSU) - WR, Green Bay Packers
Dwight Lowery (2006, SJSU) - CB, New York Jets
Chris Owens (2006, SJSU) - CB, Atlanta Falcons
Marcus Smith (2007, UNM) - WR, Baltimore Ravens
Kory Sperry (2008, CSU) - TE, San Diego Chargers
Robert Turner (2006, UNM) - OL, New York Jets
THIS WEEK’S PREVIEWS: This week there is a full day of games slated for Saturday, all of which are conference match-ups and are being televised locally or nationally. Wyoming and San Jose State have byes this week. Don’t forget links to all the games audio and stats are available at www.NewMexicoBowl.com. Some games are even available to view online. Brief breakdowns of each game slated for this week are available in the attached PDF.
THERE ARE MORE NOTES AVAILABLE IN THE PDF ABOVE!
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MWC Headings
WAC Headings
