Utah State will play the University of Hawai'i in a Western Athletic Conference football game Saturday. If that doesn't sound like a big deal, then you don't know what the Aggies have gone through just to get to the WAC.

Forget the better part of a day it took the Aggies (2-6) to travel here. In reality, theirs has been a WAC journey stretching over parts of five decades and involving, to hear some of their faithful tell it, an in-state elbow slam of long standing.

Instead of being among the last schools into the WAC — No. 21 if you're counting — this July, the Aggies figure they should have been among the founding few in 1962. Rather than knocking on the door eight times before they were admitted, some Aggies contend they would have been charter members if not for a Brigham Young and Utah cabal.

"If they wanted us (Utah State) in the WAC, we'd have gotten in," said Ladell Andersen, a former Utah State athletic director who also coached basketball at BYU and Utah. "Now, they won't lay claim to that but if they don't, they are liars."

Sound familiar?

You think UH has a bone to pick with BYU and Utah over the way they skipped out the back window and started the Mountain West Conference in 1999? Well, triple it and you have what some Aggies apparently still feel.

The Aggies shared three conference affiliations, the Rocky Mountain Conference, Mountain States Conference and Skyline, with their two instate rivals for 40 years until 1962. Then, BYU and Utah joined forces with Arizona, Arizona State, New Mexico and Wyoming to form the WAC.

At the time, the Aggies were the area's prevailing power in football. They were in the midst of a 31-11-1, two-bowl run under John Ralston. The Aggies had 9-2 and 9-1-1 records in 1960 and '61 and national rankings while producing an Outland Trophy winner, Merlin Olsen, and two All-Americans. Between 1960 and '62, they were a combined 5-1 against BYU and Utah.

Yet, when it came time to start the new conference, Utah State's invitation never arrived. Nor did it come in subsequent years as Texas-El Paso, Colorado State, San Diego State, Hawai'i and, seemingly, half the schools west of Ruston, La. got theirs.

"It really hurt Utah State, specifically in football, from that time forward," Andersen contends.

The Aggies bounced around, going independent then trying the Pacific Coast Athletic Association, Big West and Sun Belt conferences.

Just as there have been charges that New Mexico and UTEP haughtily wanted to keep their conference distance from New Mexico State, some Utah State faithful claim the same thing.

"Curiously," Andersen said, "after BYU and Utah left the WAC, we finally got in."

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8044.