By Ferd Lewis
Advertiser Columnist

BOISE, Idaho — You can only wonder — as Boise State is undoubtedly doing right now — just what the heck University of Hawai'i football coach June Jones has up his sleeve today.

Just what has the Western Athletic Conference's most daring sideline gambler dreamed up some late night this week in the darkness of the film room and covertly installed on the UH practice field?

What, alongside hand warmers, have the Warriors packed for this important trip?

For today's 2:05 p.m. Hawai'i time national cable game on ESPN2 fairly cries out for some sort of selective, well-timed "trickeration," as Don King would call it.

With Halloween closing in, what could be more appropriate than a little trick or treat?

Not that Jones ever needs much urging to make the boldly unconventional and, sometimes, controversial call.

Here you have, in one corner, Boise State 7-0 and 18th ranked playing before a sellout crowd in autumn Idaho temperatures on its own blue turf, where it has won 23 games in a row.

And in the other corner shivers 3-3 UH and its defensive unit held together by miles of medical tape and a prayer.

As 22-point underdogs on the Las Vegas betting line today, the widest UH has faced since the 2000 season, the Warriors are unlikely to win this game playing the Broncos straight up. Better teams than the Warriors, such as Oregon State and Texas-El Paso, a 31-point victor over UH, have already lost to the Broncos playing it straight.

Not that being an underdog is required for Jones to take chances. Back in 2001, before the Broncos had won anything in the WAC, Jones was trying sleight-of-hand tricks against Boise State with a UH lead at home.

A less-than-memorable one involved calling an option pass on third-and-2 from the Boise State 34 late in the game. Running back Mike Bass took the handoff, ran right and... underthrew wide receiver Ashley Lelie.

UH ended up losing, 28-21.

Today, if the Warriors' passing game shows up, the susceptibility of a Boise State pass defense that is ranked 103 among 117 Division I-A teams, should give UH a puncher's chance to stay in this game.

But to do more than that figures needing a reach into the accumulated bag of tricks of Jones' 30 years in football.

Though, hopefully, not far enough down to that fourth-and-12 pass off a fake punt from the UH 18 on the first series of the game, again.