Potato Bowl-Mountain West Olive Branch?

BYU plays Western Michigan in the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl, a reward for a 6-6 season or an olive branch from the Mountain West for BYU to join the conference.

As an independent BYU faces challenges, especially scheduling games but despite the hard road of independence the Cougars have shown little interest in joining any conference other than maybe the PAC-12, the home of arch rival Utah.

BYU took Utah's invite to the Pac-12 as a slap in the face and in turn decided to make their own future as an independent with the help of ESPN.

Now the Mountain West is starting to look better and better. The league has won 5 of the last 6 head to head showdowns with the Pac 12 dating back to Boise States win over Oregon in the Las Vegas Bowl in 2017.

Just the fact the Mountain West had a bowl eligible team in Wyoming they could have sent to the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl they opted for BYU. The Potato Bowl is an ESPN owned event as is the First Responders Bowl in Dallas. In reality Wyoming, which played in Boise last year was pretty much thrown under the bus because Boise State wouldn't play a bowl game at home and BYU was the next best bet to assure a solid game day crowd.

Done deal! Boise State has opened all of it's facilities to BYU for which Cougar coach Kilani Satake thanked the Broncos in his pre-game press conference.

Indeed the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl, ESPN and the Mountain West have rolled out the red (it may only look blue) carpet for BYU.

There appears to be more reason and support than ever before for BYU and the Mountain West to join forces and BYU's invite to Boise might just be the beginning of a new era in Mountain West Football.