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Friday Special: February 6, 2026.
For the first time, the Opening Ceremonies of the Winter Olympics and the Super Bowl are happening on the same weekend. Just ask NBC’s Mike Tirico. In Milan-Cortina and in Santa Clara-San Francisco, we’ll be watching for the Idaho ties.
HOLANI GOT THERE QUICKLY
It’s ironic that George Holani has a chance to play in the Super Bowl on Sunday. Boise State had a streak of 14 straight years with an NFL Draft pick that ended in 2024. That’s when Holani went undrafted, partly because he spent some time on the injury shelf his senior year. Holani signed as a free agent with Seattle, and he’s the guy who gets the shot on Sunday—not, say, Khalil Shakir. Holani’s stats are modest: for his career, 25 carries for 83 yards, nearly all of it this season, including his one touchdown. His other NFL TD came on one of the most heads-up special teams plays of the year. But the revelation right now is Holani’s receiving. He had three career catches for 14 yards before the playoffs; then in the NFC Championship game against the Rams: three grabs for 27 yards and two crucial Seattle first downs.
LAWRENCE DIDN’T GET THERE QUICKLY
At the other end of the spectrum is DeMarcus Lawrence. He was a star in Dallas for 11 seasons. A lot of good that did him. Lawrence finally left the Cowboys as a free agent and signed with Seattle this year. He took his 61.5 career sacks with him. The Seahawks have been good for Tank, and he’s been good for the Seahawks defense. Lawrence has missed only one game this season, and including the playoffs, he has logged 58 tackles with eight sacks, five forced fumbles, and two touchdowns on fumble recoveries (both in the same half of the same game—he’s the first one in NFL history to do that). Those are not the numbers of a 33-year-old defensive end. It has worked out famously. Said Lawrence in a social media post last winter: “Dallas is my home, but I know for sure I’m not going to win a Super Bowl there”.
ELLISS IN ELITE VANDAL COMPANY
Christian Elliss has a special distinction this Sunday. He’ll become only the third former Idaho Vandal to play in two Super Bowls. The others? Hall of Famer Jerry Kramer and Mark Schlereth. But the journey has been different for Elliss, who went undrafted in 2021. His first Super Bowl was with Philadelphia three years ago, but he played only on special teams. Elliss goes into this one as a starting linebacker for the New England Patriots, logging 94 tackles and a forced fumble this season, and that doesn’t include the game-turning one he forced in the AFC Championship Game against Denver that led to the Patriots’ only touchdown. The postgame photo of Elliss tearfully embracing his brother Jonah, an edge rusher for the Broncos, is one of the iconic images of these playoffs.
ON TO MILAN
The Winter Olympics are already underway in Milan-Cortina, with the Opening Ceremonies set for tonight. Among the six athletes with Idaho ties, Sammy Smith and Hilary Knight are the most intriguing to me. For Smith, we’re curious to see what she’s capable of on the world cross country skiing stage after following her incredibly successful multi-sport career at Boise High. Smith won Idaho Gatorade Athlete of the Year honors in soccer (twice), cross country (the running version) and track and field. Nothing says versatility like Smith’s journey from the NCAA women’s soccer national championship game in December with Stanford to the top of the podium at the U.S. Cross Country Ski Championships in January.
STILL ROCKIN’ IT AT 36
For Knight, a gold medal in her record fifth Olympiad would send the USA team captain out on top. The Sun Valley native is already underway in women’s hockey, as the Americans routed the Czech Republic 5-1 on Thursday. Knight tallied an unassisted goal near the end of the second period, driving past a defender to beat the Czech goalie top-shelf in what The Athletic calls her “greatest goal.” It was Knight’s 13th career Olympic goal—she’s one short of the American Olympic record of 14 held by Katie King and Natalie Darwitz..It’s all about that collision course with Canada now.
IDAHO GOLD
Did you know? Other than Knight’s team gold in the 2018 Games in Pyeongyang, there have been five athletes with Idaho ties to win winter gold. The first was Sun Valley’s Gretchen Fraser in 1948, winning the women’s slalom just 12 years after the famed resort opened. Then in 1984 it was Bill Johnson in the men’s downhill at Sarajevo. Johnson started ski racing as a Mitey Mite at Bogus Basin. Maybe the most celebrated Idaho Olympian is Picabo Street, who took the Super-G at Nagano in 1998. And Idaho had two gold medalists at Sochi in 2014, both in snowboarding: Sage Kotsenburg, with Coeur d’Alene roots, in men’s slopestyle, and Sun Valley’s Kaitlyn Farrington in the women’s halfpipe.
LET’S MAKE IT A TRIPLE-WHAMMY WEEKEND
Boise State has one chance to sweep a team ahead of it in the Mountain West standings, and that’s tomorrow night at New Mexico. The Lobos are the only team in the top six of the conference that the Broncos have beaten—and haven’t played twice. You could say that UNM hadn’t jelled yet when it visited ExtraMile Arena on December 30. After all, the Lobos had a chance to move into a tie for first place when they hosted Utah State Wednesday night. But they had an experience similar to Boise State when USU was in Boise last month—the Aggies ran UNM out of The Pit in second half and won 86-66. So predicting this one is difficult. How will the Broncos handle one of the conference’s best environments in their last trip to Albuquerque? Safe to say that New Mexico will be loaded for bear.
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February 6, 1990: Brett Hull of the St. Louis Blues scores on a third period breakaway in a 6-4 win over Toronto, giving him 50 goals on the season. That made Hull the first son of a former NHL 50-goal scorer to reach the plateau. Brett’s legendary father, Bobby, was in the stands to welcome his son to the exclusive club. Bobby Hull, the Golden Jet, reached that milestone five times with the Chicago Black Hawks. In 2009, Brett would be inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame, creating that establishment’s first father-son duo. Meanwhile in 1990, Brett’s brother Bart was getting ready for his junior season as a Boise State football player.
(Tom Scott hosts the Scott Slant segment during the football season on KTVB’s Sunday Sports Extra and anchors four sports segments each weekday on 95.3 FM KTIK. He also served as color commentator on KTVB’s telecasts of Boise State football for 14 seasons.)
