Well, the best Bowl Game of the 2014 football season wasn’t the Oregon and Florida State game. Nor, was it the TCU and Ole Miss game. Those were blowouts.
But, there were quite a few fun games this year in the midst of too many bowl games.
On December 22nd, the Memphis Tigers and the BYU Cougars met in the Miami Beach Bowl. The Tigers won it in Overtime 55-48.
Most fans talked about this game because of the massive brawl at the end. 20,000 people attended the game, so there was not a lot of interest. The fight made this game the talk of the week.
Maybe spending time together is not such a good idea for 2 different schools like these.
On Christmas Eve, the Central Michigan Chippewas and the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers met at the Popeyes Bahama Bowl. Like the Miami Beach Bowl, there was not a lot of interest with 13,000 fans in attendance but this stadium was tiny.
The Hilltoppers raced out to a 49-14 lead and to the Chippewas credit they came roaring back in the 4th quarter. They scored 34 straight points to close the score to 49-48.
Shockingly, the Chippewas coach elected to go for 2 instead of taking it to Overtime and even more shocking was they threw a fade route which is low percentage. Unbelievable.
Still, the ending of this game made it worth a watch.
The Sun Bowl turned out to be a really good game after Arizona State jumped out to a 20-3 lead. Duke came storming back partly behind yet another punt return for a Touchdown by Jamison
Crowder. If you have not seen Duke’s Jamison Crowder yet, it’s too late unless you catch him in the NFL. He is one exciting player and changed several games over the last couple of seasons with punt returns or big catches.
Duke closed the gap to 20-17 at the half. Arizona State threatened to pull away again and Duke came storming back yet again and took the lead, briefly,
This was a fun game to watch.
Later that same day at the New Era Pinstripe Bowl at Yankee Stadium, the Boston College Eagles fought gamely against the Penn State Nittany Lions.
True freshman Running Back Jon Hilliman ran for 148 yards and Quarterback Tyler Murphy ran for 105 yards in leading their Eagles to an Overtime game against Penn State. The Lions were led by Christian Hackenberg who threw for 371 yards and 4 Touchdowns. The Eagles missed the extra point in Overtime allowing the Nittany Lions the opportunity to win the game, 31-30.
Boston College and Penn State both finished the season at 7-6. For the Penn State Nittany Lions much is always expected and it was something of a disappointing year. Hackenberg had a really strong freshman season under head coach Bill O’Brien. Then, had a sub par season in James Franklin’s first year. Franklin is an excellent football coach as he proved at Vanderbilt and he will get the Lions back in National Championship contention.
Hackenberg threw for 2,977 yards but had more Interceptions than Touchdowns in the 2014 season.
He redeemed himself somewhat with this season ending win for the Penn State Nittany Lions. The Lions were a young team and should be a contender in the Big 10 as early as next season.
The Notre Dame Fighting Irish and the LSU Bengal Tigers met in the Franklin American Mortgage Music City Bowl in Nashville, Tennessee. Talk about a bowl name that rolls off of the tongue, but the game measured up way better than the name of the game.
It’s hard to say that 2014 wasn’t one of the more disappointing seasons in recent memory by both of these programs. Notre Dame was right in the middle of the national championship hunt in the middle of the season and Everett Golson was talked about for the Heisman Trophy. But, things fell apart for the Irish in the Florida State game. At least, the Irish will play some competition unlike some other national schools. The Irish were 6-0, then finished the season at 7-5 going into this bowl.
LSU was ranked in the top 10 early this year, but finished the regular season at 7-4.
LSU is young and to make the move to the next level in 2015, they are going to have to throw the ball better and they have the weapons at Wide Receiver to get it done if the Quarterbacks will come through.
They also have the weapons at Running Back with freshman sensation Leonard Fournette coming through as expected. Fournette ran for 143 yards on only 11 carries and a 100 yard kick off return. Fournette had 3 Touchdowns in this game.
On the other side, Notre Dame has a Quarterback controversy brewing. Everett Golson has been replaced by Malik Zaire. I reported in my blog back in the Spring that Zaire should be the better Quarterback. Both guys played with Zaire throwing for 96 and Golson throwing for 90. Zaire also ran for 96 yards.
Notre Dame came from behind being down 28-21 to tie up the score at 28 all. Then, the Irish kicked the winning 32 yard Field Goal with no time left on the clock.
This was a fun game to watch all the way around.
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The Arizona Wildcats came in as the favorite, but that did nothing to discourage the Boise State Broncos and their first year coach, Bryan Harsin.
This was not necessarily a game for those that love defense, although Arizona All-American Scooby Wright had his usual good performance.
Boise State took off to a 21-0 lead, but that’s not really anything new for the Arizona Wildcats. The Wildcats kept fighting back and they made it an interesting game with the score at 28-7, then 28-17 and then 31-17. The Broncos led 38-20 before finally winning the game 38-30. The Wildcats failed in an attempt to come back and tie the game.
The Outback Bowl between Wisconsin and Auburn turned out to be a great game. In spite of what the SEC Network would have us believe, Melvin Gordon can indeed put up good numbers against an SEC team. Not only that, but so can his back up and that’s without much of a passing game at all. Melvin Gordon ran for 251 yards and Corey Clement ran for 105 yards. That was enough to keep Wisconsin close to the Auburn Tigers where they could tie it up and kick a Field Goal to win it in Overtime.
Cameron Artis-Payne had 126 yards rushing in his last game at Auburn and Quarterback Nick Marshall continued in what was a disappointing season for him with 217 yards passing and 2 Touchdowns with 18 total yards rushing.
People had written Wisconsin off because of their 59-0 loss to Ohio State in the Big 10 championship game and their coaching loss. But, they pulled off the 31-28 upset victory over Auburn.
In the Goodyear Classic Cotton Bowl which is no longer played in the Cotton Bowl in Dallas, the Michigan State Spartans traveled down to take on the Baylor Bears.
Many people were mad about Baylor not making the new playoffs, but apparently the Bears weren’t that upset.
The Bears grabbed a 34-14 lead in the game and then a 41-21 lead in the 4th quarter only to see the Michigan State Spartans come fighting back.
Art Briles and his Baylor Bears love playing offense but they never care about defense and he’s not in high school anymore and it cost him once again.
The Spartans scored 21 straight points and beat the Bears 42-41 with 17 seconds left on the clock.
The Spartans were ranked really high as the season started because it was believed that they had the same kind of defense that they had in 2013. They lost too many defensive stars off of the 2013 team, but they were still good enough in the 4th quarter to let their offense get them back in the game and even win it.
This was yet another wild, wild finish in a college bowl game.
Then, the first ever college football playoffs began.
The Oregon and Florida State game was a disaster for the Seminoles as they turned the ball over repeatedly giving Oregon several free scores and the Ducks easily won it 59-20.
Some people are even saying the Seminoles didn’t belong in the playoffs. Huh?
Since when does a 13-0 team not belong in a championship game? A top undefeated team always belongs in the championship and especially if they are the defending national champs and there are no other undefeated teams.
The Alabama versus Ohio State game more than made up for the Oregon/Florida State game.
Nobody gave Ohio State much of a chance at all in this Sugar Bowl game, but it was clear from the beginning that it was going to be a fun game.
The Tide may have run all over the Buckeyes if they didn’t choose to try and be cute instead of pounding the football. There’s no way the Buckeyes could have withstood the Derrick Henry and TJ Yeldon if Saban had wished to run the ball.
Buckeye Running Back Ezekiel Elliott ran for 230 yards on 20 carries including an 85 yard Touchdown run.
The media had Alabama winning by 40 and probably the Crimson Tide overlooked the lowly Buckeyes since most of the nation felt that Ohio State did not belong in playoffs. Big mistake to overlook people in sports or in life.
The Buckeyes wound up winning 42-35 in maybe the upset of the season.
There are way too many bowl games and I still don’t feel that a team that has a chance of having a losing record if they lose a bowl game should be in a bowl game. But, there were many fun games to watch.