Penn State Sports Magazine
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/916653
P O S T S E A S O N P R E V I E W >> P E N N S T A T E loaded in the winter with temporary res- idents from the North, organized their own postseason late-December extrava- ganza, utilizing the home field of Arizona State in suburban Tempe as the site. There also was a subtle but significantly political reason for establishing the bowl. Arizona State and its sister school, Ari- zona, were members of the Western Ath- letic Conference, considered an inferior league by the collegiate blue bloods and perennially snubbed by the New Year's Day bowls. Arizona State and its fans had been particularly irate because the WAC champion in 1968 did not get a bowl invi- tation and the Sun Devils' superb unde- feated championship team of 1969 was fortunate to play in Atlanta's three-year- old Peach Bowl. So, the WAC champ was designated as the host team for the Fiesta Bowl. Bingo! Arizona State cruised to victories in the game's first three years of existence. Be- fore the 1976 game, the Fiesta directors added what seemed to be an attractive twist. The game would be played on Christmas Day, usually a blackout day for collegiate football except for an occa- sional all-star game. That change was enough to snare No. 5 Oklahoma, which clobbered Wyoming before a crowd of 48,714, about 8,000 less than capacity in Sun Devil Stadium. The next year, with the addition of an upper deck that increased the seating ca- pacity to 70,311, the young Fiesta Bowl became infatuated with Penn State. De- spite an 11-1 record marred only by an early-season three-point upset loss at Kentucky, the Nittany Lions were aced out of the New Year's Day bowls, partly because of political maneuvering by then-No. 2 Oklahoma in cahoots with Arkansas and the Orange Bowl. When the Fiesta Bowl reached out to Penn State, coach Joe Paterno had little choice but to accept its invitation, because the other more prestigious secondary bowls had al- ready locked up their teams. BYU was slotted as the host team after finishing as co-champion of the WAC with Arizona State, but the Mormon school turned down the opportunity because Dec. 25 was a Sunday. On Christmas Day, another record Fiesta Bowl crowd of 57,727 and CBS national TV audience watched as No. 8 Penn State, a 9-point favorite, almost blew a 17-point halftime lead but held on to beat No. 15 Arizona State, 42-30. By the time Penn State was invited back in 1980, Arizona State and Arizona had joined the Pac-10 and the Fiesta Bowl had no ties to any conference in its selection process. That year, Fiesta officials had decided to move the game away from Christmas Day as a prelude to forcing their way onto the New Year's Day sched- ule. Penn State would be a pivotal component in that maneuver. During that era, bowl pairings were locked in by mid- November, before the end of the reg- ular season. So while the Nittany Lions were 8-1 and ranked fifth in the country, they were once again squeezed out of a New Year's Day game, even before play- DESERT STORM Line- backer Don Graham chases down Vinny Tes- taverde during Penn State's game against Miami for the national title. Photo courtesy of Pattee and Paterno Li- brary Archives