Las Vegas, Mormons and BYU fans

A Las Vegas television personality asked BYU coach Bronco Mendenhall today about the dichotomy of BYU — owned and operated by the LDS Church — making an annual tradition of playing bowl games in Sin City.
‘It’s an interesting thing, especially considering that last year’s game had the highest attendance of any (team) sporting event in the history of the state and it’s an LDS school,” Mendenhall replied. “It’s a fan base that doesn’t drink, doesn’t smoke, doesn’t gamble ‘ at least isn’t supposed to. I’m not sure how excited Las Vegas is to have us, knowing we’re probably not generating a lot of income for them, other than on game day, we’re having a sell-out. Which is what the bowl game is for, from my understanding.’