KHQ Right Now - News and Weather for Spokane and North Idaho | Akey's army prepares for Bowling Green and beyond

Akey's army prepares for Bowling Green and beyond

MOSCOW, Idaho – Remember football? Amidst the excitement of college basketball, the NBA, the upcoming NFL playoffs and the Christmas holiday, it's hard to believe the Vandals still have one more game to go this season.

The football team – not the basketball team – will take center stage once again for the Vandals as they prepare to face Bowling Green in the Humanitarian Bowl Dec. 30 on the "smurf turf" in Boise. Coach Robb Akey and his army of young football players returned to the practice field this week ahead of the postseason contest.

The Vandals go into the bowl game having lost their last three regular season games. The Falcons, meanwhile, rattled off four straight wins. The two teams have an identical 7-5 record.

"We're starting the week off with the guys who have been doing the playing during the season – working on getting the edge to come back right now," said Akey.

While the focus is obviously on the current batch of starters who have put the Vandals in a position to be invited to a postseason bowl game in the first place, make no mistake. Playing in December is also about preparing next year's crop of players.

"With the young guys, we're still working some developmental work. So it's kind of like spring ball-style," said Akey. "It's gonna be more like that [on Tuesday], and then we'll start working into the gameplan for the bowl game, and that gives us a nice transition there and gets things headed the way we need to."

For Idaho, the Humanitarian Bowl is their first postseason appearance since 1998 when they went to the same bowl as a member of the Big West Conference and beat Southern Mississippi 42-35.

Bowling Green is making its second bowl game in three years after consecutive berths in 2003 and 2004.