We didn't want to see the event end. The Holiday Bowl put a lot of love and sweat into building the Speed Festival. We offered the team all the staff knowledge and help we could give them. We'll have volunteers out there this weekend to help. We hope it works out.

We don't see that with Oregon. Oregon's come here with a great attitude. When Hayden Fry came in here with Iowa, he always said their goal was to go to the Rose Bowl first, but if they couldn't, he preferred coming to the Holiday. I think the Pac-10 and Big 12 feel that way now. I don't see it as a problem.

We were hoping it would follow the Holiday Bowl tradition of a high-scoring game and a lot of yards gained. The only pattern we've seen in the Holiday Bowl is people don't turn their televisions off.

We want to have two major bowl games in town. And it's been the luck of this town that we've had high-scoring games.

I certainly didn't think (the Poinsettia Bowl) would happen as fast as it did. The day after we made our presentation (to the NCAA), they called in and said, 'Congratulations, you've got a second bowl game in San Diego.' We were confident we could pull it off, but never did we think it would happen this soon.