FanHouse LasVegasBowl

Turkey Legs to Go is FanHouse's complete travel guide for all of the 2008-2009 college bowl games. Here, we cover the Las Vegas Bowl (Las Vegas, Nevada), which pits BYU against Arizona.

Overview/Matchup: The beauty of going to a bowl game in Las Vegas is that, well, it's Las Vegas. The tremendous downside is that, well, yeah, it's still Las Vegas. In other words: college student in Sin City is always dangerous. This year, it's the Cougars of BYU and the Wildcats of Arizona that will face temptation and each other.

Hotels: If you're going to be in Vegas you might as well stay on The Strip. All three of these hotels are Las Vegas landmarks. They each offer rooms that cost several thousand dollars a night, but Caesars Palace and The Venetian also frequently have rooms for one or two hundred. If budget's a concern, avoid the Wynn Las Vegas. It's worth trying to find a cheap room to stay in the heart of Sin City. As for convenience, the stadium is only five minutes away.

Restaurants: Mesa Grill is Bobby Flay's signature restaurant. Try the coffee-spiced rotisserie filet mignon with wild-mushroom-ancho-chili sauce and horseradish potato gratin. Trust us, you won't be disappointed. Burger Bar offers the best burgers in Vegas. From huge and greasy to elegant and refined, they've got the burger for you. Try the Kobe beef and lobster burger. Pink Taco... the name's a little scandalous, but they serve creative Mexican fusion and the restaurant is adjacent to the pool at the Hard Rock, so it's a great place to get appetizers and party.

Just minutes after UCLA announced that it would have a head coaching vacancy in its football program, its leading candidate turned down the job.

Boise State head coach Chris Petersen, identified this morning by the Los Angeles Times as the Bruins' top pick, told the Idaho Statesman that he is not interested in Karl Dorrell's old job.

Peterson told the paper that he has been contacted by one school--but was not interested--and would not say whether that was in addition to the interest from Westwood.

The difference in cost of living should be enough to make someone like Petersen want to stay in Boise, where a $850,000 salary would be the equivalent of more than $1.5 million in Los Angeles.

Since joining the Bowl Championship Series system, the Pac Ten has been the perennial odd-man out, and history repeated itself again as the Kansas Jayhawks were selected to play in the Orange Bowl, leaving Arizona State as the off-man out.

Pac Ten Commissioner Tom Hansen is likely not amused--but nor should be be surprised. The BCS has a history of giving the conference the short end of the stick.

In 2001, the Oregon Ducks were jumped over by a Nebraska team that lost its final game and left out of the Rose Bowl. Two years later, USC was ranked #1 in both human polls, but left out of the Title Game. A year later, Mack Brown lobbied enough pollsters to jump Cal for the final automatic qualifying spot and a Rose Bowl berth, and in 2005, Oregon missed an automatic BCS berth by one slot.

Although it is considered by many to be the second-toughest conference in College Football, the Pac Ten looks like it will not fill all of its bowl allotments in 2007.

The Pac Ten has arrangements this year with the Rose, Holiday, Sun, Las Vegas, Emerald and Armed Forces Bowls. That is six bowls before you consider that either Arizona State or USC will likely get a BCS at-large invitation if either team wins its final two games.

Five Pac-Ten teams are already bowl-eligible: Oregon, ASU, USC, California and Oregon State--but coming up with a sixth--or even seventh--will be much more difficult.