The Futon Report

Ray Bentley mentioned this during the Ball State-Western Michigan game (scroll to 10:06), but Boise State and Ball State really do need to play each other, assuming Ball State can beat Buffalo in the MAC Championship. The Mid-Major Championship. The BSU Bowl.

One problem though; they’ll probably have to play the game in Boise.

Pairing Boise State and Ball State may hinge on luring the Cardinals to Boise and the Dec. 30 Humanitarian Bowl, to which Ball State coach Brady Hoke already has expressed some aversion. He doesn’t relish meeting the Broncos in Boise, he said. To counter that concern, officials are working on sweetening the Humanitarian’s $550,000 monetary and ticket guarantee, designating Ball State as the dark-jerseyed home team and perhaps obliging Boise to make a regular-season return trip to Muncie, Ind.

Image by BlueTurf via FlickrSo, yeah, playing on the blue field would certainly favor the Broncos. They could also play the game in Detroit, but that’d favor Ball State, even though the ground is green and not red. They could play in Shreveport, which would benefit the Independence Bowl custodians since few will travel to that game.

Sidenote: anyone screaming “playoffs” at this point needs to remember that in a playoff system, these two teams probably wouldn’t play each other unless they were to, y’know, meet in the championship. Maybe if bowl tie-ins weren’t so conference-specific and conferences actually worked to pair interesting teams together, more people would like them.