Thursday, May 15, 2008.

The Roady's Humanitarian Bowl has hosted an ACC team in six of the past seven years. There will be another in 2008, but that'll be it for representation from the Eastern seaboard, as ACC commissioner John Swofford confirmed at the end of the conference's meetings that the ACC's trip to Boise this December will be its last. "We'll lose (the ACC) mainly because of the licensing of new bowl games," said H-Bowl executive director Kevin McDonald yesterday on Idaho SportsTalk. That means with more bowls, there will be games available that are more geographically friendly to the conference. One of those is the new Congressional Bowl in Washington, D.C. Bowl inventory has increased by about a third since the Humanitarian Bowl was born in 1997, and BCS conferences now find themselves in a buyer's market.

Now McDonald will have to go out with his hat in his hand. The H-Bowl would like to stick with a BCS conference, as difficult as that might be. To hang on to one of the big enchiladas, he knows he'll have to increase the game's payout. "There are only so many options to go after." With 34 bowl games now on the menu, McDonald acknowledges that a day could come that would leave the bowl system short of enough eligible teams to play, and the H-Bowl would not be immune to the consequences.

So let's check the WAC vs. ACC scorecard in the six head-to-head matchups. There have been two ACC blowouts (Clemson beating Louisiana Tech 49-26 and Georgia Tech routing Tulsa 52-3); two barnburner ACC wins (Boston College holding off Boise State 27-21 and Miami nipping Nevada 21-20); and two WAC victories--both by Fresno State (37-34 in overtime against Virginia and last year's 40-28 victory over Georgia Tech). The H-Bowl may have always had the sixth or seventh or eighth selection out of the ACC, but it created intrigue.

A former feature receiver at BSU could be lining up against the Boise Burn next month. Lawrence Bady, the Broncos' career leader in yards-per-reception, has been traded from the af2's Green Bay franchise to the Stockton Lightning, who face the Burn again in California June 21. The af2's release says Bady has been placed on Stockton's "refused to report" list, though. It sounds like the Lightning are going to try to change his mind. Bady was slated to play in the new All-American Football league this spring, but that circuit folded before it began. He had two catches for 15 yards with Green Bay.

The WAC Track & Field Championships are on low-heat today as the men's decathlon and women's heptathlon wrap up--then it comes to a full boil tomorrow. Along with the weather. Idaho appears to be the team with momentum going into the heart of the meet, having taken three WAC Athlete of the Week awards between the men's and women's teams in each of the past two weeks. The Vandals' Russ Winger has been on a tear all season and leads the nation in the shot put, and Idaho's Melinda Owen is tops in the country in the women's pole vault. Boise State's top athlete, Simon Wardhaugh, gets right into it tomorrow in the first event of the day, the hammer throw. Wardhaugh is currently seventh in the nation in that event.

Boise State's Troy Merritt tees it up today at the NCAA West Regional at Gold Mountain in Bremerton, WA, gunning for his sixth straight tournament victory and eighth overall this season. Merritt is seeded first out of the six invited golfers from teams that didn't make it to regionals. All he has to do is finish first or second among those players in the 54-hole event to get an invitation to the NCAA Championships in two weeks. But the pressure increases with every leap Merritt makes. He has shot under par in eight straight rounds and in 14 of his last 15. Merritt is ranked fourth in the nation in the Golfstat Cup Standings with a 69.2 scoring average.

Our former Boise Hawk of the Day is John Lackey, who got his first start of the season for the Angels last night after a month-and-a-half stint on the disabled list with a right triceps strain. Lackey, last year's American League ERA leader, was sharp, going seven innings against the White Sox and yielding just one run on six hits. But another Boise alum, Scot Shields, spoiled the moment for the 6-6 righthander. Shields came on in the eighth inning and served up a grand slam to Chicago's Carlos Quentin, and the Angels lost, 6-1. It was only the fourth time in 17 appearances this season that Shields has allowed runs.

This Day In Sports...May 15, 2003, five years ago today:

In the midst of a national hubbub over Annika Sorenstam's upcoming appearance in a PGA Tour event the following week, the Albertson's Boise Open announces a sponsor's exemption for 13-year-old Hawaiian phenom Michelle Wie. The eighth-grader with the 290-yard drives would be the first female ever to play a Nationwide Tour event.

(Tom Scott hosts the Scott Slant segment Sunday nights at 10:30PM on KTVB's Sunday Sports Extra and anchors five sports segments each weekday on 1350 KTIK/The Ticket. He also handles color commentary on KTVB's telecasts of Boise State football.)

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