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BOISE, Idaho >> What are you doing on Dec. 7?
Well, if the University of Hawaii football team can somehow, someway pull out a breakthrough victory tonight on the tidy bowl turf of Boise State, you might want to start thinking about your calendar options for that date.
That is a big “if” of course. Thirteen-and-a-half points big, say the odds-makers who have made the 14th-ranked Broncos the significant favorite.
But in a place where the Warriors have not won in six tries and have rarely been close, today’s 4:15 p.m. (Hawaii Time) game against 5-0 Boise State sets up as their best shot since 2006.
What is worth considering, should UH prevail in this one, is that it could well be a dress rehearsal for the Dec. 7 Mountain West Championship game.
The winners of the West Division, where UH competes, and the Mountain Division, where Boise State has regularly ruled, meet Dec. 7 to decide the conference championship and prime position in the league’s bowl lineup.
To the division champion with the best winning percentage in conference games goes the host role. Which is why this game could carry additional, down-the-road significance.
The picture begins to gain some clarity after tonight. If the 4-1 (1-0 conference) Rainbows emerge victorious in the nationally televised game, it will stamp them as prime contenders for that West Division title with what shaped up as their two toughest road games already out of the way.
UH put together its most complete, all-around (offense, defense and special teams) victory in at least nine years in its last outing, the 54-3 pummeling of Nevada in the snowflakes and rain of Reno. You have to go back to at least a 41-7 thumping of San Jose State in 2010 to find as well-tuned and all-inclusive a victory.
Buoyed by winning at Nevada, a place where victory had eluded them in eight of nine previous meetings and coming off their last restorative open date of the regular season, Hawaii seems to have a lot of things in their favor for this one.
After today, UH will play four of its final six conference games at home, including division foes Fresno State (2-2) and San Diego State (4-1) and Mountain Division opponent Air Force (3-2). Its only remaining road stops will be at New Mexico (2-3) and Nevada-Las Vegas (1-4), one or both of whom could be in the midst of coaching changes by the time UH shows up.
There are no guarantees, of course, but that is a promising path toward what would be UH’s first MWC division title.
Which brings us back to the importance of the considerable task at hand tonight before a national television audience on ESPN2.
Only Provo, Utah, where UH is 0-10 against Brigham Young, has been a tougher place for Hawaii to win than Boise. UH’s six losses on the blue FieldTurf have come by an average of 35 points. Not since 2006, when UH lost 41-34, has one been what you would consider close.
But this team, through its efforts against Arizona and Oregon State and at Nevada have, so far, proven to be a resilient, focused group undeterred by the elements or history.
If the Warriors manage to stay that way, who knows what might be waiting for them come Dec. 7?
Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.
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