ESPN has their first look of early bowl predictions. These are a little different from College Football News Early Bowl Predictions.
For ESPN they have five teams going bowling for the Mountain West, and here is their preview:
Mountain West Conference
BCS bowl contenders
BYU: Early games at Washington and against UCLA will go a long way in determining whether the Cougars can crash the BCS party. With 13 starters coming back, including quarterback Max Hall, BYU might be poised to become the third unbeaten non-BCS team in as many regular seasons.
Should go bowling
Air Force
New Mexico
TCU
Utah
Wait till 2009
Colorado State
San Diego State
UNLV
Wyoming
Bowl Predictions:
New Mexico
Fresno State Bulldogs vs. New Mexico Lobos
San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia
Air Force Falcons vs. Arizona Wildcats
Pioneer Las Vegas
Utah Utes vs. Oregon Ducks
Bell Helicopter Armed Forces
TCU Horned Frogs vs. Southern Miss Golden Eagles
Tostitos Fiesta
Oklahoma Sooners vs. BYU Cougar
This BYU team does have a good shot at making a BCS game they just need their secondary to step up, and they need to find their groove early on. With BYU's schedule and how good the team could be it could possibly survive an early loss to either Washington or UCLA, but it would be best to go undefeated which should guarantee to the Cougs a BCS bid. The other bowl bid that looks puzzling is Air Force being predicted to go to the Poinsettia Bowl, and that is because the Falcons lost Z-Back Chad Hall and QB Shaun Carney to graduation plus many others. The other teams that have shot is either Wyoming of Colorado State to take that fifth spot. The fifth spot, especially the BCS berth will increase the revenue for the league from the money attributed to the bowl payout.