Apple Cup moved back one week
PULLMAN – Hello, bye. Farewell, turkey dinners.
In announcing its football schedule for 2007, Washington State made a couple of significant changes, agreeing with Washington that this year’s Apple Cup will be played on the Saturday after Thanksgiving, Nov. 24, thus creating room for a bye week in midseason.
Last year, the two schools played 12 straight games and, as has been the custom, played the Apple Cup five days before Thanksgiving.
But with Washington willing to play host on the holiday weekend, the 100th Apple Cup has been moved to this later date for the first time since 1978.
Oregon State, previously scheduled to play WSU on Oct. 20 in Pullman, agreed to move that game to the weekend before Thanksgiving, meaning that WSU’s bye will come after seven games, almost perfectly centered on its schedule.
“The bye week allows them time to catch up academically where they’re not traveling that week and they have an extra day off or two,” WSU A.D. Jim Sterk said. “The downside of (playing during Thanksgiving week) is that we’re not in school. Our team needs to be housed and fed. Our dorms aren’t open and our food service isn’t open during Thanksgiving. That’s the downside, plus, kids not being able to go home.”
In fact, the Huskies and Cougars seem to have found a solution that will buy them three years in the ongoing debate over the timing of the Apple Cup. Sterk said WSU is still unwilling to host the game on Thanksgiving weekend because so many people leave Pullman for the week, but in 2008 the calendar works out so that all 12 games plus a bye can happen before Thanksgiving. (The Cougars will still play a road game after the holiday, as they have a 13th game scheduled at Hawaii.) In 2009, with Washington hosting, the schools can repeat this year’s scheduling plan.
Things could get stickier, Sterk said, in 2010, when WSU is at home and the calendar doesn’t cooperate. WSU is trying to build support to convince the NCAA to allow the season to begin a week earlier, thus allowing for 12 weeks and bye before Thanksgiving. If that’s not possible, the only remaining options are to play the game two weekends after Thanksgiving or to again forego the bye week.
“The schools that are semester schools, we’re already in school for a week (in August) and we would rather play it early,” Sterk said. “And also, probably northern schools where we can play in great weather.”
Some changes could still take place to the 2008 schedule. The Cougars open in Seattle against Utah, but Sterk said he doubted his school would play Idaho that year, a sentiment echoed by Idaho A.D. Rob Spear.
WSU had some conversations about trying to back out of the game this fall after former WSU defensive coordinator Robb Akey took Idaho’s head coaching job last month, but it was too late. But if WSU can find a replacement game, the two schools are unlikely to meet again after this fall, at least in the near future.
“Robb Akey and (Bill) Doba don’t want to play each other,” Sterk said. “But I think from Rob and my standpoint, we each needed to still play the (2007) game.”
Even if the 2008 game is canceled, the Cougars are guaranteed a pair of September games in Pullman that year because California and Oregon both will make the trip on the last two weekends of the month.