From "The Dark Knight" to sunny day

It’s back to work this morning for the BYU football team. The Cougars took the day off Thursday to watch the latest Batman movie, “The Dark Knight.”

BYU will hold two practices today before tomorrow’s scrimmage at LaVell Edwards Stadium. Coach Bronco Mendenhall has said the team may or may not scrimmage again next Tuesday. The season starts two weeks from tomorrow against Northern Iowa.

FoxSports.com has an article today BYU fans will be interested in. Not that it’s the first time that Mendenhall has been a part of a list of “Coaches on the Rise.” This list has Mendenhall as the No. 1 coach on the rise. This is what it says about him:

“There’s a chance Mendenhall might stick around Provo and not be off elsewhere. After all, he’s a true believer in the BYU program. But if he keeps up what he’s been doing over the past few years, he might get an offer he can’t refuse. Mendenhall was all about restoring pride to the program, and he’s done that and then some, going 28-10 with two straight 11-2, Mountain West-title seasons. Mendenhall’s a former Oregon State defensive back, so would taking over for Mike Riley be a big enough move coming from BYU? Probably not, but for a coach who’s fantastic at respecting traditions and making one-time powerhouses great again, he might be a natural for a name Pac-10 program like … The Next Logical Step: Washington head football coach.”

Others on the list are Todd Dodge, North Texas (10), Jim Harbaugh, Stanford (9), Al Golden, Temple (8), Troy Calhoun, Air Force (7), Brian Kelly, Cincinnati (6), Mark Dantonio, Michigan State (5), Jeff Jagodzinski (4), Will Muschamp, Texas defensive coordinatory (3), and Todd Graham, Tulsa (2).

In other news, it looks like BYU could be playing at Tulane next season. Tulane’s athletic director, Rick Dickson, told the Times-Picayune that Alabama dropped Tulane from next year’s schedule, creating an opening that he said will be filled by BYU. The Alabama-Tulane game was scheduled for Sept. 12, 2009.

We’ll try to find more about this today after practice.

Here, in part, is what the Times-Picayune reported:

“We feel that we are lined up well with BYU next year, then LSU for two seasons and then Alabama,” Dickson said. “This started out with us having LSU and Alabama at home next year, but we wanted to balance out the schedule.”

Dickson added that along with the ESPN guarantees, there are other financial considerations involved in the switch.

The Alabama-Virginia Tech deal had been in the works for several weeks and depended on the Tide and ESPN finding an opponent for Tulane.

Dickson said that team will mostly likely be BYU with the formal announcement to be made next week.

Tulane defeated the Cougars in the 1998 Liberty Bowl to wrap up its 12-0 season but then lost at BYU, 70-35, in 2000.

Dickson said the deal with BYU would include a future game in Provo. Utah.

No date is set for the 2009 Tulane-BYU game. The Alabama game was scheduled for Sept. 12.