It’s Brigham Young vs. Utah, which is all the reason you need to watch the Royal Purple Las Vegas Bowl on TV — but only on TV, because the game is sold out, and it will cost a pretty penny to score a ticket on StubHub at this late hour.
Sports Columns
When the announcement was made Sunday afternoon, he was wearing a dark blazer, pressed white shirt with an open collar, dark trousers and black-and-white crocheted Nikes that seemed a cross between skate shoes and bedroom slippers.
It was February 2001, the Las Vegas Outlaws vs. the Memphis Maniax, the XFL on UPN. Surely you remember the XFL.
If you are one of those people who take perverse pleasure in watching people more famous than you fail, then you must have enjoyed watching kickers miss extra points and field goals in the NFL last weekend.
They went all out (or in) at the annual Las Vegas Bowl Ticket Kickoff Luncheon at Vinyl at the Hard Rock on Wednesday.
The email arrived Sept. 5. It was slugged: “This is really happening!” It was about Jeremiah Poutasi of Las Vegas earning the starting assignment at right offensive tackle during the Tennessee Titans’ training camp, then being penciled in to start in the trench against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in his first NFL game.
If there’s anything most Las Vegas sports fans can agree upon, it’s that Sam Boyd Stadium and Cashman Field stink, and that hopefully there will be places to park at the new hockey arena.
From Air Force to Wyoming (which isn’t actually that far, but as far as it gets in the college football alphabet) institutions of higher learning and four-star recruits are naming starting quarterbacks. It has become a ritual. You just can’t have a starting quarterback. You have to name one.
When he died of natural causes at age 84 on Sunday, people started telling stories about The Giffer again. Actually, when you think about it, they never really stopped telling them. This is a tribute to Frank Gifford — that long after his playing career, it seemed he always was relevant.
When you’ve been down for as long as UNLV has in football, you’re going to have to take an occasional risk on the recruiting trail — you might have to accept an Alabama reject or two, or maybe go for a quick fix via the junior colleges. Longtime observers of the local football scene are aware of this.
Other than going 2-10 or 2-11 most seasons, and having spectators depart Sam Boyd Stadium in mass-exodus-style after the third quarter, the UNLV football program mostly is bereft of tradition.
A bunch of seasons ago, after he was drafted in the fifth round by the NFL‘s Oakland Raiders, it was decided a good time should be shown to rookie quarterback David Humm after the veterans had arrived at training camp.
The Las Vegas Sin of the LFL doesn’t play its home games in Las Vegas anymore and the players don’t get paid much, if anything. But the players still have great stories — such as Cynthia Schmidt, who was an officer in the Indiana National Guard.
Another installment of the 50-yard indoor war was raging toward its irrelevant conclusion Sunday afternoon before a paltry crowd at the Thomas & Mack Center when it was noticed the Las Vegas quarterback, No. 12, Sean Brackett, was from Columbia.
It wasn’t supposed to be a draft party. It was supposed to be just a small group of well-wishers and intimates watching to see where Jeremiah Poutasi, Samuelu and Olaka’s oldest football-playing son, would be selected in the annual pro football talent grab. And by whom.