What do you consider to be your school's best year/team in both football and basketball?

Idaho would probably have to go with the 1998 Big West championship/Humanitarian Bowl football team, and the 82/83 (may have the year wrong?) Don Monson-coached basketball team, which finished the year with only three losses, advanced to the Sweet 16 in the NCAA tournament, and was ranked as high as 6th in the nation by the AP Poll during the season.

9570, I would agree with you for both sports.
In basketball, the year was 81-82 and the Vandals advanced to the Elite 8 before losing to Oregon State, who we had beat earlier in the year 71-49!

With USU football it has been a long time since the Golden Age of Aggie football. We had some great teams in the 60's to late 70's. In 1961 Merlin Olsen won the Outland Trophy and was later inducted into the College and Pro Football Hall of Fames. He was on the 75 year NFL Anniversary team.

Since 1980 it would have to be 1993. We won the LV Bowl that year. In 1997 we went to the Humanitarian bowl, but lost to Cinncinati.

In 1936 we went 7-0-1 the only undefeated season we have had. However the best team was probably 1961 which went 9-1-1.

Basketball is a little different. We went to the elite 8 in 1969. We also have had a lot of success especially lately. We haven't done really well in the tournament, but we have won a lot of games. We did beat Ohio State in the NCAA tournament in 2001. We have made 16 appearances, but I would like to see us make some deeper runs in the next few years.

Probably the best was in 1969, followed by 2001. We did go 25-3 in 2004 and I felt like the team had a good chance in the tournament, but we were snubbed. :crying:

For Nevada:

Basketball’s a toss up between each of the last two years: I have to give the nod to the 2003-04 Sweet 16 team
A solid case could be made for last year’s 2004-05 team (16-2 WAC record, including 9-0 on the road), but then there’s that #!@*% WAC tourney loss to Boise.
Expectations are that this year’s team will be even better, and that scares me a bit.

Honorable mention
Late 70s team that featured two 2nd round NBA draft picks (Johnny High and Edgar Jones)

Football’s a tough choice, but I’ll go with:

1996: 9-3, Big West co-champs; losses @ Oregon, @ Cal, & @ Idaho (15-24); wins over UNLV (54-17), BSU (66-28), NMSU (63-14), & @USU (54-27); LV Bowl win over Ball St. (18-15)

Honorable mention
1991: 12-1, 11-0 regular season; 28-30 loss to Youngstown St., 2nd round D1AA playoffs
1986: 13-1, 11-0 regular season; 38-48 loss to Ga Southern 3rd round D1AA playoffs
1995: 9-3, Big West champs; undefeated in conference; 55-32 win over UNLV in front of Mackay Stadium record crowd (33,391); 37-40 LV Bowl loss to Toledo;
1978: 11-1, 11-0 regular season; led by RB Frank Hawkins, who set a D1 career rushing record
1990: 13-2, 10-1 regular season; back-to-back 3OT wins over Furman and Boise St. in D1AA playoffs before losing to Ga Southern
1985: 11-2, 10-1 regular season; only conference loss 21-25 to Idaho
1947: 9-2, including Salad Bowl win over North Texas; led by QB Stan Heath

It's interesting that Idaho and Nevada's "best seasons" both feature a loss to Nevada/Idaho.
Here's a look at Idaho's bowl season: Losses to Nevada, Washington State, and LSU, but an overtime victory over Boise State that the Vandals will always talk about, and the bowl win over a good Southern Miss team.

1998

9-3, 4-1 Big West (1st)

Humanitarian Bowl Champion –
Coach: Chris Tormey


W Eastern Washington 31-14

W at San Jose State 17-12

L at Washington State 16-24

L at Louisiana State 20-53

W Idaho State 52-3

W at Arkansas State 52-14

W at Utah State 26-14

L Nevada 23-58

W at North Texas 41-23

W New Mexico State 36-32

W at Boise State 36-35 (ot)

W Southern Mississippi 42-35 (Humanitarian Bowl)

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Other notable Vandal victories (out of conference) of the 1990's and 2000's include:

1992 W at Colorado State 37-34 (Idaho was still D-Iaa)

1993 W at Utah 28-17 (Idaho was still D-Iaa)

1994 W at UNLV 48-38 (Idaho was still D-Iaa)

1999 W at Washington State 28-17

2000 W at Washington State 38-34

2002 W San Diego State 48-31

I had a similar thought while looking up records. Idaho and Boise were consistently the main competition during Nevada’s best years.

(Nevada regular season records)
Big Sky
1985: 10-1, only loss to Idaho (21-25)
1986: 11-0, only close games being Idaho (17-13) & Boise (21-16)
1990: 10-1, only loss @ Boise (14-30), plus a close game w/Idaho (31-28)
1991: 11-0, repeat of 1986, with only close games being Idaho (31-23) & Boise (17-14)

Reunited in Big West
1996: 9-3, only conference loss Idaho (15-24)

It'll be nice to have Idaho and Nevada going at each other again... Honestly, I think the Sun Belt was a disaster for Idaho football from a lot of perspectives:

A.) No true rivalry games - the players did not get up for opponents like Middle Tennessee State like they would for Nevada, Boise State, etc. Interesting that Idaho still consistently beat Utah State and New Mexico State, while losing to the Louisiana schools...

B.) Travel was brutal - four (or more) trips south during the conference schedule had to wear on the team. Travel fatigue should be greatly reduced in the WAC (last year, Idaho played conference games in Tennessee, Alabama, and Texas, and the year before traveled to Arkansas, Louisiana twice, and Tennessee - all a bit farther than Boise, Nevada, Fresno, etc). Louisiana Tech and Hawaii are still difficult road trips, but I'd rather have two long travel trips than an entire conference of them.

C.) Recruiting visibility was terrible. Idaho (Moscow) is Pacific Northwest, playing in a conference in the south east. When our only NW, or even west, games are getting blown out by Washington State and Boise State, and then we play the rest of the schedule against no-names from the other side of the country, it's probably pretty tough to sell a program.

I hope Idaho seizes the momentum of the move to the WAC, and builds the program, starting with facilities. Giving Nevada and Boise State hell again would be a great place to start...

clpack Wrote:I had a similar thought while looking up records. Idaho and Boise were consistently the main competition during Nevada’s best years.

(Nevada regular season records)
Big Sky
1985: 10-1, only loss to Idaho (21-25)
1986: 11-0, only close games being Idaho (17-13) & Boise (21-16)
1990: 10-1, only loss @ Boise (14-30), plus a close game w/Idaho (31-28)
1991: 11-0, repeat of 1986, with only close games being Idaho (31-23) & Boise (17-14)

Reunited in Big West
1996: 9-3, only conference loss Idaho (15-24)

Kind of fun to rivalries that go back 30 years.
Idaho, Nevada & Boise State will always have that connection.
I think all of us have been playing Utah State for a long time too.

Remember the triple overtime D1AA playoff game in Reno????

broncobob Wrote:Remember the triple overtime D1AA playoff game in Reno????

Yes, I do. It was in 1990, and was the second 3OT playoff win in a row for Nevada (the previous week was over Furman). Those two games, the comeback (1991, I think) against Weber St. (largest comeback ever, at least at the time), and the "snow bowl" win over North Texas (~1980) would have to rank as the most entertaining games I've attended. Uh oh, I'm dating myself.

Memories have gotten fuzzy over the years, so it was fun to look up the reminders.

Vandal 9570, I don't see what you mean about Idaho consistenly beating Utah State. The series has been pretty even, USU is 4-3 vs. Idaho since 1996. And 15-14-2 all time versus the Vandals.

<a href='http://cfbdatawarehouse.com/data/div_ia/sunbelt/utah_state/opponents_records.php?teamid=1499' target='_blank'>http://cfbdatawarehouse.com/data/div_ia/su...php?teamid=1499</a>

NavyBlueUSU Posted on Jun 27 2005, 02:24 PM
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Vandal 9570, I don't see what you mean about Idaho consistenly beating Utah State. The series has been pretty even, USU is 4-3 vs. Idaho since 1996. And 15-14-2 all time versus the Vandals.

<a href='http://cfbdatawarehouse.com/data/div_ia/su...php?teamid=1499' target='_blank'>http://cfbdatawarehouse.com/data/div_ia/su...php?teamid=1499</a>
[QUOTE]

And most of those losses came in the 20's-50's. I'm not sure what you mean either. The 3 recent losses have come at one of the worst periods in USU football history.

Aggies,

I guess I should say that, in the Sun Belt, Idaho was more competitive with Utah State and New Mexico State than with some other teams and programs that, honestly, probably weren't as good, and I'd probably attribute that to player/fan/rivalry interest. Idaho only played Utah State twice in the Sun Belt, winning 20-13 in Moscow and losing 14-7 in Logan. While it's a small sample size, the point distribution on that is 27 to Idaho and 27 to Utah State. Unfortunately, our series against Middle Tennessee, Louisiana-Lafayette, etc. was not so evenly distributed over our time in that conference.

In general, our series with Utah State and New Mexico State were played very even through our time in the Sun Belt, which was not the case with some schools which certainly were not better football programs over that same time interval. Idaho went 1-3 against Louisiana-Lafayette in the Sun Belt conference, a team that did not generally perform well in the conference. Why did we fare better against Utah State and New Mexico State, playing closer games and ultimately winning more games? Easier travel, player interest due to something like a rivalry (more history), etc. And I think these things will continue to benefit Idaho (and USU and NMSU) in the WAC. I think the Aggies and the Vandals will get up for games against Nevada and Fresno State more than games against Middle Tennessee and Arkansas State. The competition for us has increased, but so has interest in the opponent.