Boise State, TCU, and Utah played non-BCS teams and won... a lot. No reason we cannot do the same if it comes to that. The only thing our program needs to worry about is winning and instilling a winning culture. The rest will take care of itself. If Boise State were relegated back to the MWC when the dust settles, do you feel that they are now irrelevant? I don't.
As far as excitement is concerned, there really hasn't been a conference foe besides WVU that got us excited to play, unless they were ranked. Well Rutgers got us fired up because f*** Rutgers.