Last summer, I believed Hawaii could win two of its Big Four early-season road games at Florida, Oregon State, Fresno State and Boise State.

Specifically, I figured the losses would come at Gainesville and Fresno. Oregon State seemed vulnerable from afar with most of its defense having moved on. (I didn't count on UH's special teams being terrible early on, or the Beavers' little stud true freshman running back, Jacquizz Rodgers, being so good.)

That left Boise State as the other possible W.

My reasoning was sound: From last year's team, the Broncos lost their quarterback, most of the offensive line (including the WAC's best left tackle, Ryan Clady), and a lot of their best defensive players, including shutdown cornerback and special teams pest Orlando Scandrick.

It's obvious now that Boise State has answered most of the offseason questions. It seems like business as usual for the Broncos, unbeaten and ranked going into tonight's game.

Freshman Kellen Moore is showing why he beat out a senior to be the starting quarterback, and Ian Johnson, one of the nation's most accomplished and experienced running backs, is now just one of a multitude of BSU playmakers.

But the offensive line remains somewhat shaky, and this is the weakness Hawaii must exploit if it is to win for the first time on the blue turf. Yes, the Broncos are full of all kinds of tricks to deal with blitzing defenses, but Greg McMackin still needs to roll the dice and go for big plays on defense to have a chance.

Sitting back passively (which is not Mack's style anyway) can only lead to trouble, like UH's first trip to Boise, in 2002, when the key to BSU's 58-31 win was the longest touchdown drive I've ever seen—a 10-minute march, with Tim Chang and the rest of the Hawaii offense helplessly cooling off on the sideline. The Broncos were 6-for-6 on third- and fourth-down conversions on that drive alone.

In the 2004 game at Boise, the Broncos replaced water torture with repeated hammer blows in a 69-3 embarrassment for UH, and not just because of the score. This was the night Chang was supposed to break the NCAA career passing-yardage record on national TV, but instead became the all-time leader in interceptions.

What's worse than the wrong end of a 66-point blowout, you ask? How about a 16-hour delay getting out of town after an agonizing 41-34 loss caused largely by your own mistakes? That was 2006 at Boise, when special teams mishaps and a Colt Brennan fumble led to UH's last road loss to a WAC team.

The records and the point spread are definitely not on the side of the visitors tonight.

Boise State is the only team in the conference Hawaii has yet to beat on the road. Since that 2006 loss, UH has won at Fresno twice and every other WAC joint once. In fact, the Warriors are 17-1 in conference games overall since that long, long night at the Boise airport.

The only longer wait has been the one for UH's first victory at Bronco Stadium.