BOISE, Idaho — Wednesday Weekly: July 19, 2023.
Fifty years ago, there was a hit song called “Break Up To Make Up” by the Stylistics. That could be playing softly in the background at Mountain West Media Days right now. The conference got out ahead of it Tuesday when it informed San Diego State that the school is a member in good standing following the league’s presidents meeting. The Aztecs will get the $6.6 million they more than earned by making it to the NCAA Tournament championship game in April. They’ll just have to cover some MW attorneys’ fees. But the Mountain West made its point. Rules are rules. SDSU will be a Mountain West member through at least June 30, 2025, unless it wants to cough up an exit fee of about $34 million to leave before then. Yes, it was hard to imagine this thing not working out.
ANDY’S EXPECTATIONS
We haven’t heard the words “Bobby Dodd National Coach if the Year” around here in a long time. But Boise State’s Andy Avalos was named late last week to the 2023 Dodd Trophy Preseason Watch List. The award celebrates a coach who not only succeeds on the field, but also in the areas of scholarship, leadership and integrity. Avalos is the only Mountain West coach on the list and one of only two Group of 5 coaches (Tulane’s Willie Fritz is the other). Chris Petersen won the Dodd Trophy in 2010 with arguably the Broncos’ best team in history. They did have the infamous loss at Nevada — a game they should have won — but the rest of the season was jaw-dropping impressive, starting with the Virginia Tech win. For Avalos, it’s a step in the right direction just to be in the discussion.
THE SNEAKY ASCENSION OF THE O-LINE
Following up on last week’s discussion of Boise State sacks on the defensive side of the ball — let’s talk about sacks on the offensive side. It hasn’t been talked about enough. The Broncos went from 27 sacks allowed in each of the last two full seasons to just 14 last year. And here’s what happened before and after Taylen Green took over as starting quarterback. In the first four games last season, Boise State gave up five sacks for 60 yards, a rate of 12 yards per sack. In the final 10 games, the Broncos allowed nine sacks for just 54 yards, six yards per takedown. There was always that thing about Hank Bachmeier hanging onto ball too long. But even with Bachmeier in there, Boise State was on pace to drastically reduce its sacks. That’s where the offensive line came in: one of the most improved units on the team.
REMEMBER GEORGE HOLANI
George Holani returned to Boise State this season to become the best running back he can be. How will that translate into the NFL Draft next spring? Dane Brugler’s preseason top 20 senior running backs list in The Athletic has Holani at No. 15. That may be too far down the board to be drafted. There were only two running backs selected in the top 50 picks in April. The two issues for Holani in his quest to take it up a notch is health and Ashton Jeanty. An injury-plagued 2021 season saw him net 569 yards and one touchdown. Holani missed the equivalent of about two games last year and bounced back with a career-high 1,157 yards and 10 touchdowns. Jeanty? He’s going to steal a lot of carries, but what will matter to NFL scouts is how Holani performs when he does have the ball in his hands.
MEADOW AN NIL MAGNET?
It didn’t take long for Boise State hoops newcomer Andrew Meadow to land his first significant NIL deal. Meadow’s goggles are his signature, and he has partnered with “eyegear” company Liberty Sport to promote their products, especially goggles. Meadow’s initial endorsement: “On and off the court, Liberty Sport's Rec Specs have been my go-to for goggles and glasses since I was 7.” Meadow, if he plays as well as everyone thinks he will, is going to become a Bronco Nation fan favorite. That won’t be Meadow’s last NIL contract.
THE CHANGING FACES OF MEDIA
B.J. Rains has made a lot of “big announcements” in the 20 months since Bronco Nation News was founded. But Monday’s was seismic. BNN has picked up Jordan Kaye from the Idaho Press as a full-time contributor. So many thoughts on this. The media world has changed so drastically. Kaye is a really creative writer, almost along the lines of the late Jim Poore, the Idaho Statesman legend. He’s young, and he’d seem to be on the fast track. That he chose this lane is telling, and it’s too bad for the Idaho Press. What will they do now? I always felt Jordan was so dang good that he wasn’t long for this market. But this move tells me he’s all in on Boise, and that’s he’s at least here for a while. Which is good for everybody. And I love his first little piece of commentary: “How the heck is Kellen Moore’s number still not retired?!?”
STEFANIC’S FIRST BIG MLB MOMENT
My “This Day In Sports” feature Monday talked about the five native Boiseans who have made the majors. The latest is Timberline High grad Michael Stefanic, whose 62-game on-base streak at Salt Lake this season earned him another call-up with the L.A. Angels last month. Stefanic appeared in just three games before returning to Triple-A. But now he’s back on the Angels roster after being recalled last Friday. And what a lifetime memory he created Monday night. Stefanic came on as a pinch-hitter in the bottom of the 10th inning and rapped a walk-off single for the Angels to beat the Yankees 4-3. It was kinda overshadowed by Shohei Ohtani's game-tying homer, his 35th (and an accompanying bat flip) ... but oh well.
CLEAN SLATE FOR THE HAWKS – AND EVERYBODY ELSE
The “second half” season is underway for the Boise Hawks and the rest of the Pioneer League. The Hawks opened it last night with an 8-6 loss to the Great Falls Voyagers at Memorial Stadium. Boise ended the first half at 28-20, a vast improvement over last year’s 17-31, and took second place—three games behind Ogden in the South Division. What happens now? Short answer: the Hawks just need to be the best team not named Ogden over the second half of the campaign to make the PBL Playoffs in September.
JORGENSON’S UNFORTUNATE FRENCH FINISH
Boise High grad Matteo Jorgenson was part of the chaotic crash in Sunday’s Stage 15 of the Tour de France, and that led to a Tuesday Twitter post we hoped would never come. “An ultrasound on the rest day yesterday confirmed what I thought after coming down in the big crash on Sunday,” Jorgenson tweeted. “My right hamstring has a very similar tear to my left leg after a crash in Paris-Nice last year. It will only get worse from racing.” And with that, his 2023 Tour de France was over. Jorgenson was in 48th place in individual standings when he had to withdraw. He had produced his first-ever podium finish in a stage of the Tour de France in Stage 12, taking third. Jorgenson had also finished fourth a few days earlier in Stage 10.
THE RARE VANDAL-TO-BRONCO TRANSITION
That was an interesting coup Boise State men’s tennis coach Luke Shields announced last Friday. Shields has hired Idaho head coach Daniel Hangstefer as the Broncos’ new associate head coach. Hangstefer has been guiding the Vandals the past five years and has 10 years of experience as a college head coach. The 2023 Big Sky Coach of the Year guided Idaho to two conference titles in the past three seasons and two NCAA Tournament appearances. Shields, a Boise State Athletic Hall of Famer, just finished his first season with the Broncos, earning a Mountain West championship and an NCAA Tournament berth.
SURPRISE ANNOUNCEMENT
It was news to Idaho Central Arena and the Boise Metro Chamber of Commerce. But the Arena Football League announced a comeback in 2024 yesterday and unveiled 16 locations. One of them was Boise. We’ll see. The AFL, with its two storied bankruptcies (the last one five years ago), is going to give it another shot. It’s been almost 15 years since the Boise Burn finished its three-year run in downtown Boise. The Burn played in af2, which was tied to the old AFL, and a 2009 bankruptcy doomed both. A number of former Boise State players and other locals played for the Burn. Meanwhile, former Broncos kicker Kyle Brotzman, at the time the highest-scoring kicker in NCAA history, was an AFL regular a decade back, primarily with the Utah Blaze.
THIS DAY IN SPORTS…July 19, 1933, 90 years ago today:
Two competing brothers hit home runs in the same inning of the Cleveland Indians’ 13-inning 8-7 victory over the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park. Wes Ferrell, a pitcher for the Indians, went deep in front of brother Rick, the Red Sox catcher, in the top of the fourth inning. Then Rick hit a homer off Wes in the bottom of the frame. And with that comes a Baseball Hall of Fame anomaly. Rick Ferrell, who hit 28 homers in 6,028 career at-bats, is in the Hall of Fame. Wes Ferrell, who had the most homers by a pitcher in major league history with 38--and went 193-128 with six 20-win seasons — is not.
(Tom Scott hosts the Scott Slant segment during the football season on KTVB’s Sunday Sports Extra and anchors four sports segments each weekday on 95.3 FM KTIK. He also served as color commentator on KTVB’s telecasts of Boise State football for 14 seasons.)
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