Deep Cover - Code Name: EWU

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, will be to find the most ridiculous analogy possible to apply to your football program's highlight video. Mission accomplished.

There are times in every program's evolution when transcendental vision, unified ambition, and talent coalesce into a singularity of purpose and produce greatness for the ages. The people who put together Eastern Washington's 2008 highlight video, no doubt after dozens of late nights burning their eyeballs out in the editing room, thought they had reached that moment with the video below. Unfortunately they were, in the words of Harry Doyle, "JUUUST a bit outside."

Couple of guidelines on making a promo video for your football program.

1. Don't use the 1950's reel-to-reel black and white, grainy video effect, with the 1920's silent film fuzzy border for anything football related that doesn't involve leather helmets, the Four Horsemen, Vince Lombardi, or a hallowed moment in your program's history that predates color television. A 2008 press conference to announce the hiring of your new coach does not qualify.

2. Don't use the eerie war chant classical music with the horns and drums while flashing words like "Honor" and "Pride," and then show a clip of your team being led out of an inflatable tunnel with an eagle mascot driving a four-wheel ATV.

3. Oh and about those words, "Honor" and "Pride," they can be doozies. If you think there's even a shred of a chance you miiiight get put on probation within a year of making the video (cough cough), you might want to rethink putting those words in bold in your video. Irony can be a cruel thing.

4. Unless you're program's mission is to embed a spook assistant coach on an opposing team's staff and steal game film or sabotage their game plan, football and espionage are about as analogous as football and the Betty Ford Clinic. Your players are not "agents."

5. Don't ever, under any circumstances, use as background music for a football promo video 80's action TV soundtracks from shows like the Fall Guy.

Ok, I kid. Good for EWU for loving their program. And I'm sure the players and coaches could care less about this stuff, which is all that matters on Saturday. But I got a kick out of this one.



Here are the rest of the 2008 highlights, broken up into three videos. Analysis and breakdown to come.