RAMSEY: CU, DU could have rescued AFA schedule

It's simple. It really is.

Air Force's basketball team should play the University of Denver and the University of Colorado. The teams should meet every season.

The games would produce great plots and jazzed crowds in Colorado Springs, Denver and Boulder.

Instead, the Falcons will stumble through a ridiculous nonconference - and noncompetitive - home schedule that includes such lightweights as Western State, the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, Stonybrook, Pan American and Wofford.
Wake me when it's over.

The Falcons could better prepare for Mountain West Conference games by competing in a quality men's rec league.

The first game worth watching at Clune Arena won't arrive until 2009. On Jan. 3, the San Diego State Aztecs - along with genuine college basketball - will walk into Clune.
It didn't need to be this boring. The solutions to this disaster of a schedule are nearby.

DU is a natural opponent. Its star, Rob Lewis, excelled at Evangelical Christian Academy. Its assistant coach, A.J. Kuhle, is one of the more important players in academy history.

Joe Scott, DU's coach, resurrected Air Force.

"I would like to play Air Force," Scott said Thursday. "I called to play them. I said, ‘Your place, our place.'"

Scott shrugged his shoulders. He didn't care where the game was played. He just wanted the game.

"Ultimately, in the end, we wanted to play," Scott said.

AFA coach Jeff Reynolds offers a different version. He said he "never" talked with Scott about a head-to-head matchup.

He did, he said, try to include the Pioneers in the Nov. 22-23 Reggie Minton Air Force Classic, but the teams would not have played each other.

The AFA-DU rivalry is such a natural it would make sense for the teams to play a home-and-home series each season. They should - they must - play at least once a season.

"I haven't thought much about it," Reynolds said.

Hope lingers for a future AFA-DU clash. Reynolds wants to tangle with Lewis, Kuhle, Scott and the rest of the Pioneers next season.

Banish all hope when it comes to the Buffs. Reynolds is a close friend to CU coach Jeff Bzdelik - so close he won't consider playing CU.

"He's just too good a friend," Reynolds said.

Come on. Why should friendship stand in the way of a great game?

Reynolds should know by now there's little in life more satisfying than defeating a close buddy.

Yes, Bzdelik abandoned the Falcons in 2007, but that's ancient history. He carried himself with class last season during his return to Clune, smiling while feisty cadets mocked him.

He's a tactician who will run a clean program in Boulder. Bzdelik would, if Reynolds ever plays him, test the Falcons and push them to a higher place.

Reynolds insists he tried to craft a more interesting schedule. He negotiated with representatives from Georgetown, Georgia Tech, Oklahoma State, Oklahoma and Texas Tech.

"We worked it and worked it," Reynolds said.

But it never worked out, leaving the Falcons and their fans burdened with one of the nation's worst nonconference schedules.

There is, nestled in the middle of this mess, one attractive game in the final months of 2008.

The Falcons play at Stanford on Nov. 26.

Unfortunately for fans, Palo Alto is a 945-mile drive from the Springs.

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Columnist David Ramsey can be reached at 476-4895 or david.ramsey@gazette.com. For more from Jeff Reynolds and Joe Scott, check out David's blog, David Ramsey Says What?, at daveramseysez.freedomblogging.com