The Rogue League Presents: Sports Flashbacks

friday, october 31st, 2003. cougar stadium. boise state at byu.

this was a nationally televised thursday night game on espn. boise entered the game on the fringe of the top 25. byu entered the game firmly within the butt 25. however, it was halloween night, and anything could happen. we smelled an upset.

the three things i remember most about this game:

1) it was balls cold. this is sort of unusual for the provo area, where it typically doesn't get that cold until around thanksgiving. there was no real need for a thermometer; your balls told you everything you needed to know. A slushy snow fell throughout the game, accompanied by a moderate wind.

2) our first two scores were safeties. at one point, the score was 28-4. after a 3rd quarter touchdown by us (more on this in a moment), the score became 28-12, at which point one clever fan yelled out "only 8 more safeties!" i'd like to point out here that 10 safeties in one game is really only possible in tecmo bowl. also, i think it's probably safe to assume that this was the only time in NCAA D-1A history that a score has ever been 28-4.

3) during the aforementioned 3rd quarter touchdown drive, we used all three of our timeouts in one series inside the boise state 10-yard line. let me repeat that: ALL THREE SECOND HALF TIMEOUTS!!!!! IN *ONE* SET OF DOWNS!!!!! one was on 2nd and goal, the second was on fourth and goal, and the last one was on the 2-point conversion. gary crowton's amazing preparation for that series of plays really cannot be overstated. to be fair, i suppose, it was a critical part of the game, and cut the lead to 28-12. and more importantly, our offense actually scoring was really important.

of course, boise state got the ball back and scored in like 3 plays or something. then a lot of people started leaving, probably because it was cold and we sucked. i had the faith though, that we would come back, and thus i stuck around to the bitter end.

final score = boise state 50, byu 12

good times...good times...