BYU Football: Getting to know the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl

While it may not be the most exciting bowl that BYU Football could be playing in, the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl has slowly become a postseason staple.

• The Humanitarian Bowl
• The Crucial.com Humanitarian Bowl
• The MPC Computers Bowl
• The Roady’s Humanitarian Bowl
• The uDrove Humanitarian Bowl
• The Famous Idaho Potato Bowl

What do all of these bowl games have in common?

They’re all the same bowl.

In its 22-year history, the bowl game in Boise, ID has changed sponsors six times and changed the bowl’s name three times.

The Idaho Potato Bowl is one of the few cold-weather bowls left, and it’s the longest-running one. 30 different teams from eight different conferences have played in the bowl, with Boise State and Utah State taking part the most (four times apiece).

How it all Started

It’s a bowl that began in desperation. When UNLV left the Big West Conference for the Mountain West Conference in 1996, the Las Vegas bowl switched affiliations as well.

Suddenly the Big West didn’t have a place to send their conference champion, until Boise State’s president proposed a bowl game on the Smurf Turf.

The Humanitarian Bowl was born, with the Big West champion slated to take on a Conference USA opponent.

But the Big West doesn’t play football anymore, and C-USA has moved on to other bowls. Since that 1997 season the bowl has been affiliated with six different conferences:

• Conference USA (1997-1999)
• Big West (1997-2000)
• Western Athletic Conference (2000-2012)
• Atlantic Coast Conference (2001-2008)
• Mid-American Conference (2009-Present)
• Mountain West Conference (2013-Present)

And now an independent team will play in the bowl for the first time, as BYU Football replaces a Mountain West team to take on the MAC’s Western Michigan.

Record Setters

Want to see BYU set the bowl’s scoring record? That’ll be a tall task.

Idaho set that record in 2016 with 61 points. That game with Colorado State also set the combined scoring record at 111.

How about margin of victory? Georgia Tech set that one in 2004 with a 42 point beatdown of Tulsa.

The Cougars have a better chance at breaking the record for fewest points allowed. That happened in the 2004 game as well, as the Yellow Jackets held the Golden Hurricane to just 10 points.

How about individual records?

• Passing Yards – 445 (Nick Stevens, Colorado State, 2016)
• Rushing Yards – 307 (PJ Daniels, Georgia Tech, 2004)
• Receiving Yards – 265 (Olabisi Johnson, Colorado State, 2016)

The 2018 Version

The Famous Idaho Potato Bowl has never been among the most prestigious bowls in the country, and 2018 doesn’t change that.

A 7-5 Western Michigan team will face a 6-6 BYU squad in a weekday afternoon pre-Christmas game. And while the payout is decent for a lower-tier bowl ($950,000), it’s certainly not a giant payday for the Cougars.

But it’ll be front and center on ESPN, and the game has carved a niche for itself that has allowed the bowl to stay viable for more than 20 years. It’s a rare cold-weather bowl, yet it has a reputation for high-scoring finishes even in the bad weather.

For BYU it’ll be a good gauge of how good they really are at the end of the year after a rollercoaster season.

Plus, it’s another chance to finally win a game on the Smurf Turf.

2018 Famous Idaho Potato Bowl

• Western Michigan vs. BYU – Friday, December 21st at 2:00pm MT (ESPN)