MWC football: MWC, Humanitarian Bowl reach deal

BOISE — The Mountain West Conference and Western Athletic Conference will meet in the Humanitarian Bowl in 2009 after an agreement announced by MWC commissioner Craig Thompson and Roady's Humanitarian Bowl executive director Kevin McDonald.

"The Mountain West Conference is excited to partner with the Roady's Humanitarian Bowl for the 2009 season and looks forward to a continued relationship in 2010 and beyond," Thompson said. "The MWC has averaged five bowl-eligible teams over the past several seasons. We are pleased to secure a fifth guaranteed slot for our member institutions in this established and respected game."

Qualifying teams will be selected according to each conference's criteria for bowl participation, with the Mountain West Conference committed to send its fifth-place finisher, if the team is bowl-eligible, to the Roady's Humanitarian Bowl.

All bowl relationships nationwide — including those for Roady's Humanitarian Bowl — will be re-setreset for the bowl games that follow the 2010 regular season. That nationwide re-set gives Roady's Humanitarian Bowl a potential opportunity to attract highly-ranked national programs.

"Boston College, Miami, Fresno State, Louisville, Georgia Tech, Clemson and Boise State have played in the Roady's Humanitarian Bowl," McDonald said. "Our goal is to retain and grow this caliber of competition by increasing payouts to bowl teams."

A team representing the Western Athletic Conference has participated in the Humanitarian Bowl each of the last eight years.

"Over the past several years the WAC and Mountain West have demonstrated a very high level of national success on the football field — both regular season and in the bowl season. We look forward to carrying that success — and rivalry — over into Roady's Humanitiarian Bowl," said WAC Commissioner Karl Benson.

"As Roady's Truck Stops continues its rapid growth in the West, this new alliance with the Mountain West Conference is a fit that makes good business sense for our team," said Mike Knee, Roady's Truck Stops' project manager for the bowl game. "We look forward to teams from the Mountain West Conference having the same high qualityhigh-quality experience that we've delivered to visitors from the Southeast. They just may be a little more familiar with our traditional winter sports day activities than athletes from the ACC."