Idiotic Harris college football poll update...

...or, I've got an Idaho Vandals hat too. Wouldn't it be cool to vote them into the Top 25?

From Kurt Kragthorpe of the Salt Lake Tribune comes the latest on the scheme destined to destroy the BCS. (Yippee!)

Having taken over a team that won only 10 games the past three seasons, Utah State coach Brent Guy will soon discover that overconfidence is not a major issue for the Aggies.

Just in case that's a factor in this week's preparation for Idaho, however, Guy is warning his players that the winless Vandals are "a very hungry team."

They're also nationally ranked, strengthening Guy's case for taking them seriously.

Idaho is not in anybody's Top 25, exactly, but the Vandals are listed in the "others receiving votes" category of the inaugural Harris Interactive Poll, now accounting for one-third of the Bowl Championship Series standings.

When the poll was added to the formula this past summer, a Harris executive said the 114 voters would add "independence" to the BCS process.

Boy, did they ever. Someone did, anyway, giving Idaho a 21st-place vote worth five points in the poll, good for a tie for 43rd place.

"Oh, my goodness," said Glen Tuckett.

If you know Tuckett, you know that's about as strong of a verbal reaction as he will ever have.

The former Brigham Young athletic director is on the panel, a role he's enjoying as a longtime football follower. So here's Tuckett, agonizing that he may have listed Michigan State a little too high and somewhat sheepish about ranking Vanderbilt No. 25, and then he finds out somebody voted 0-4 Idaho even higher.

At least Vandy is 4-0, for goodness sake.

Tuckett and Mountain West Conference commissioner Craig Thompson each theorized that the voter's ranking of "Iowa" was mistakenly recorded as "Idaho" - poll members can phone in their ballots - but a Harris official confirmed that Idaho really was cited.

Was it a joke? Or was somebody watching the Vandals a little more closely than the rest of us?

Here's what a little research reveals about them, material Guy is free to use in his pregame speech Saturday in Moscow:

+ Idaho just may be the best 0-4 team in Division I-A football, better than Florida Atlantic, New Mexico State or Temple.

+ The Vandals truly deserved to score in last week's 24-0 home loss to Hawaii, gaining 153 total yards and once driving all the way to the Hawaii 38.

+ Those black-and-gold uniforms, resembling the New Orleans Saints' look, are sweet. And the script "Vandals" on the helmets? Inspiring.

Thompson is not amused by any of this, knowing that Texas Christian (No. 35) is the only Mountain West team ahead of Idaho in the poll and that the rankings will determine his league's access to BCS games, this year and in the future.

"You tell me if 114 people are paying attention," Thompson said. "Maybe the Mountain West has got to do a better job of getting our message out . . . It's extremely important that we are recognized. I do not respect the opinion of a person who would vote a team with zero wins in the top 25."

The Harris Poll includes about twice as many voters as the AP Top 25 or the USA Today coaches poll, offering some protection from a maverick member. But there were other outrageous results. Among other teams receiving votes were Illinois, coming off a 61-14 loss to Michigan State; Arizona, whose only win was over Division I-AA Northern Arizona; and Bowling Green, a 48-20 loser to Boise State.

The funny thing is, the Harris board - consisting of former college players, coaches and administrators and some current media members - was supposed to have more credibility, not less, because its first rankings were issued after the fourth week of the season, avoiding the guesswork of preseason polls.

Nice try. And there's no pinpointing the Vandal supporter, because only the final ballots submitted Dec. 4 will be made public.

Yet amid all of the controversy, this weekend's trip to Idaho is shaping up nicely for Utah State. The winless Vandals could become the highest-ranked team the Aggies have beaten in a long, long time.