Fiesta
Bowl Pick
Boise State
vs.
Arizona
12/31/14
As the top ranked team from the minor five FBS conferences, Boise State gets a shot in the Fiesta Bowl again where they are 2-0. The Broncos will face off with Arizona, who got walloped in the Pac-12 title Game. The Wildcats are a -3.5 point favorite and are getting a decent amount of action.
While both of these teams — and coaches — have had impressive seasons, Arizona is getting most of the attention. Rich Rodriguez has gone from a mockery at Michigan to the Pac-12 Coach of the Year in Arizona. No one expected this team to win the Pac-12 South at the beginning of the season above teams like UCLA and USC. The Wildcats finished 10-3 with their two regular season losses against UCLA and USC, but they were the only team to beat Oregon this year and won big Games late in the year against Utah and Arizona State. With a new QB and RB, that’s quite the feat.
Boise State has a new coach themselves with Bryan Harsin leading the way to an 11-2 record after the departure of Chris Petersen to Washington. This hasn’t been a typical BSU team led by a strong defense, as it’s now the offense taking charge scoring close to 40 points per Game. They let the Ole Miss Game slip away in the opener after giving up 28 points in the Fourth quarter, but made easy work of almost every other team on the Schedule outside of the loss at Air Force. Still, the Broncos didn’t get a great non-Conference win and their best wins on the year are a toss-up between Colorado State, BYU, SDSU, Utah State and Fresno State.
Neither one of these teams is great on the defensive side, but that’s not to say this will be a complete shootout with no defense played. Arizona has shut some teams down this year including Oregon and the same can be said about Boise State. The Broncos didn’t give up more than 20 points in their final three Games.
The balanced Arizona offense will be a tough test for Boise State. Freshman Anu Solomon (27 TDs, 7 INTs) has been great in his first season and one of the main reasons for the team’s success. The same can be said about freshman running back Nick Wilson (1,289 yards, 15 TDs), who has stepped right in to the Ka’Deem Carey role. This group has struggled at times against top competition, but as seen in back-to-back 40-point efforts against Utah and ASU, they can score.
Zona probably has the better defense of the two led by linebacker SCooby Wright, who has a crazy 153 tackles, 14 sacks and 28 tackles for a loss. He won awards for the nation’s top defensive player and top linebacker.
The Broncos offense will lean on their bread-and-butter early in this Game to try and control the tempo. That would be Jay Ajayi (1,689 yards, 25 TDs) and the running Game. Ajayi has been a beast this season and even garnered 179 total yards and 4.3 YPC against Ole Miss in the opener, which is a solid day against that defense. Maybe the more important piece of the offense for this Game is the passing attack led by Grant Hedrick (70.9% completion, 22 TDs, 13 INTs). Hedrick has been a better QB this season and could be called upon if Arizona’s offense gets going.
It can’t be forgotten that this Game is played in Arizona, about a two-hOur drive from Zona’s campus.
The Broncos are 1-4 ATS in their last five vs. the Pac-12 and 1-5 ATS in their last six Games on grass. The Wildcats were actually only 5-8 ATS this season, 1-8 ATS in their last nine Games on grass and 6-14 ATS vs. a team with a winning record.