Posted on: Friday, November 5, 2004
Nothing's ever out of WAC
By Ferd Lewis
Advertiser Columnist
Is the Western Athletic Conference a great league to be in or what?
Moan and groan all you want about the 12-hour road trips. Mutter about the revolving door membership if you like.
But it is weeks like this that should make the University of Hawai'i glad to have a WAC membership card and even happier to have a WAC football schedule.
Where else in Division I-A football these days can you get your doors so completely blown off 69-3 by the first-place team and then turn around and be a 5-point favorite over the third-place team, Louisiana Tech, on the Las Vegas betting lines just eight days later?
Where else can your offense have taken a couple of conspicuous weeks off and your defense be a poster patient for Kaiser Permanente and still be in the thick of the conference standings?
You don't find those kind of possibilities in the Pac-10. Don't hold your breath on that happening in very many Bowl Championship Series conferences, either. Or, even in WAC volleyball.
But this is wacky WAC football, where salvage scenarios abound. These Warriors should be darn grateful to be here, where, three-quarters of the way through the conference football season, such a wide assortment of possibilities is before them. Amazingly, they can still finish anywhere from second place to dead last in the 10-school conference.
This despite not having won a road game in three tries or beaten a team with an above-.500 record.
Anyway, at 3-3 in the conference with two games remaining, the Warriors' fate in the WAC is still very much in their hands. Though, at times this season, that hasn't always been the most comforting of thoughts.
With games against Louisiana Tech and Fresno State still before them, second place, currently occupied by Texas-El Paso, wouldn't be easy and contains some decidedly "iffy" propositions. Like UH, the nation's 116th-ranked rushing defense, containing Ryan Moats, the No. 6 rusher, Saturday, and beating Fresno State on the road. Then, UTEP struggling down the stretch or suffering a meteor shower.
Not likely, of course. But, hey, after what the Warriors have been through, you didn't think it would be easy, did you? It is remarkable that there is any sliver of an opportunity open to them.
For that they should thank their lucky stars — and their continuing WAC membership.
Bless the WAC, for this is the league of wide-open opportunity. Now, if only the Warriors can salvage something by taking advantage of what is still available to them.
Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8044.
