As the bowl season progresses, sometimes you can find out things about conferences based on the way the games play out.
In the case of the American Athletic Conference, things just got less clear last night.
While Tulsa was able to easily take care of Central Michigan on Monday afternoon, Memphis, which also boasts a strong offense, was outgunned by Western Kentucky on Tuesday night. The Tigers had beaten Houston to end the regular season, suggesting that they would be able to hang with the Hilltoppers.
On the other hand, it’s difficult to determine a conference’s strength based on other bowl results, given the multiple factors that go into a bowl performance.
Tomorrow night, we’ll visit the blue turf for its annual bowl game. Let’s take a look at the game taking place on December 22.
Famous Idaho Potato Bowl
Colorado State vs. Idaho (Thursday, 7 PM ET – ESPN)
It isn’t a home game for either team, but both Colorado State and Idaho have plenty of experience on the blue turf. The Rams are a current conference foe of Boise State in the Mountain West, and the Vandals used to play their in-state rivals yearly until 2011. It is interesting that for what may be Idaho’s final bowl game (the program will move to FCS in 2018), the Vandals will not leave the state. Whether that helps the team at all remains to be seen.
Unfortunately for the Vandals, there isn’t much extraordinary to talk about. In fact, this game may be as much a coaching battle as anything else. Idaho is led by Paul Petrino, brother of Bobby, who has to be using this game as a potential job interview considering the program’s future move to a lower division. And the Rams are led by Mike Bobo, a head coach on the rise who was Georgia’s offensive coordinator before joining Colorado State. Bobo’s offense should be the difference in this one. Quarterback Nick Stevens isn’t flashy, but gets the job done and makes good decisions in the pocket. I have the Rams low on the confidence scale as the Vandals may be extremely excited to be in this game and could come out on fire.
My Pick: 31-20 Colorado State
Bowl Mania Confidence Points: 6
If you’d like to share your opinion on Around The Corn for any of the upcoming bowls, shoot me an email with your thoughts and prediction to kbecks@aroundthecorn.com. You can also like Around The Corn’s Facebook page or send me a tweet @KBecks_ATC. As long as you send your thoughts at least two days before the game is to be played, I can assure you that your thoughts will show up in an article.
