WAC's New Commercial "Play Up"

The WAC is using a new commercial to advertise it's new "Play Up" campaign. It will air this upcoming Friday, August 26 during ESPN's college football preview show. The WAC needs to take advantage of the fact that it is the only non-BCS conference to have a team ranked in the Coaches or AP poll. Boise State and Fresno State are ranked in the preseason polls for the first time in their respective school's history. Boise State is ranked 18th by the AP and 19th by the Coaches, while Fresno State is ranked 24th by the AP and received the highest amount of others receiving votes in the Coaches poll. Both schools have high profile games this year, and have hopes of earning a BCS bowl. Utah proved last year that a preseason ranking and an unblemished record are just enough for a non-BCS school to achieve the coveted automatic BCS bid.

Boise State must get by road trips to nationally ranked Georgia and Pac 10 squad Oregon State, only to return home to face All-American quarterback Omar Jacobs and MAC favorite Bowling Green in the first three games of season. Fresno State has a trip to Oregon and host MAC champion Toledo within ten days of each other in September, and travel to two time defending national champion USC on November 19. The two nationally ranked WAC powers meet on November 10 in Fresno in what looks like to be the unofficial WAC championship game. No doubt, if either Fresno State or Boise State run the table, they will have earned the right to play in a BCS bowl.

The WAC is hoping it's new found national presence, and new western configuration is a sign of new things come. Since the initial split of the sixteen team conference in 1999, the WAC has gotten very little respect nationally, while the Mountain West is widely considered the best non-BCS conference. Fresno State and Boise State carry the flag for the WAC, in a year when no other non-BCS school is on the national radar.