BYU's basketball team, which squeaked by Dixie State last weekend in its final exhibition game, opens the season Friday at Utah State.
ESPN.com looks ahead to the Cougars' inauguarl season in the West Coast Conference, where Gonzaga has claimed 11 consecutive league championships. Coach Dave Rose told ESPN.com that winning the conference will be a stiff challenge.
"So for those who think Brigham Young downgraded leagues by leaving the Mountain West, Rose believes the WCC will present an even greater challenge for a program coming off a Sweet 16 appearance and five straight NCAA tournament bids," writes Diamond Leung. “'We won four of the last five regular-season championships in the Mountain West Conference, and to do that in this league will be way more of a challenge than what we’ve seen because there were good teams in the Mountain West Conference, but there wasn’t the same team with the same tradition and the same expectation,' Rose said."
Turning to football, BYU is coming off a bye week and will host Idaho on Saturday. ESPN.com projects that the Cougars will face Southern Miss in the Armed Forces Bowl on Dec. 30. Southern Miss has an 8-1 record and is rated No. 22 in the latest BCS rankings.
BYU is the most popular choice to join the Western Division of the Big East, according to this fan poll.
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Jeff Call has been a sportswriter for the Deseret News since 1997. He is the BYU beat writer and has been covering Cougar sports since 1993, when he served as sports editor at the Daily Universe. Call has written several more ..
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I expect the Cougars to struggle early as they get their guard play figured out, but we'll see significant improvement once Carlino gets into action and Zylsta moves over to his natural position at the 2 spot.
Tough early match-ups will be More..
ute alumni,
why didn't you say right after Utah's goes to a bcs bowl or right after Utah wins a bcs bowl or right after Utah earns a bcs invite?
LOL. We did those things.
LOL.
Chris B:
Why would you be talking about football on an article talking about BYU dethroning the Zags in bball? Oh, I know! Because the Utes can't dethrone Adams State.
Can the cougs dethrone the zags? As of now: no. But Dave More..