PROVO — The Cougars are going bowling after moseying around in LaVell Edwards Stadium Saturday night in a 42-23 win over UNLV where temperatures were below freezing.
Miami isn’t too shabby of a landing spot after Saturday and the polar vortex shrouding the state this past week.
“It has not been an easy season, and games aren’t easy,” said head coach Bronco Mendenhall. “I am happy for this team, and we’re looking forward to going to another bowl.”
Christian Stewart notched his third career 300-yard passing game, completing 18 of 32 passes for 325 yards and three touchdowns with an efficiency rating of 172.5 in leading BYU’s attack. He also ran six times for 38 yards.
It isn’t an easy chore to take a team to 10 consecutive bowl games. For a team that’s suffered plenty in October, gaining a trip to the Miami Beach Bowl is a big deal.
"It's BYU's tradition," said Stewart.
Why so, some argue, when there’s such a glut of bowl games these days?
BYU joins the Pac-12’s Oregon in building 10-straight bowl appearances this season. No other program in that league has done that. Ever.
Colorado almost did in the ’80s and ’90s, but its run stopped at nine. USC got a streak of nine from 2001 to 2009, and Washington enjoyed a string of nine straight.
LaVell Edwards strung together 17-straight bowl appearances (1978-1994) in his heyday when there were not as many postseason opportunities. Alabama has been to a ton of bowl games and had a string of 11 from 1959 to 1970. Nebraska rattled off 35 bowl games in a row from 1969 to 2003. Michigan had 33 from 1975 to 2007.
So, one may argue what it means or does not mean, but the fact is, going to 10 straight is unique. UCLA, ASU, Arizona, Cal, Stanford, Oregon State and Utah haven’t done it. Washington State has just 11 bowl games in its history.
So Saturday night, on a bitterly cold affair, BYU earned a 10th straight bowl.
“It’s hard,” said Mendenhall. “I don’t know if enough is made of it, but consistency is hard. It’s my job to get this team wins, and I’m trying to get this team to finish hard, and playing in a postseason game they’ve earned is a reward.”
This is a battered team making a comeback, fighting through disappointment after starting 4-0 and losing stars Taysom Hill and Jamaal Williams, plus nine other big contributors for most of October.
It wasn’t a pretty game. Officials, complete with reviews and timeouts and prolonged discussions, made the fourth quarter unbearable. So did some of the play.
Both teams made enough mistakes to produce major head scratching. In the end, BYU gained 592 total yards on a Rebel defense that’s struggled to get out of the way of its shadow.
The Cougars lacked consistency on offense for most of three quarters. It appeared the game plan was to get senior receiver Jordan Leslie as many long catches as possible for his highlight video.
Once the Cougars settled into a rhythm and BYU’s defense knocked out UNLV starting quarterback Blake Decker on a third-quarter hit by Logan Taele, the expected rout/spanking this game was supposed to be became reality.
If you closed your eyes and erased the memory of Harvey Langi and Devon Blackman muffing a kickoff and punt return reception, and somehow forgave Nick Howell’s defense for letting Rebel running back Shaquille Murray-Lawrence bust a 68-yard TD run, then this was a good November win by a Cougar team that had to shake off plenty of physical and mental anguish.
This was a Saturday where plenty of name programs suffered mightily. They included Northwestern, a previously three-win team upsetting No. 18 Notre Dame in overtime 43-40; three-game winner Kansas, doormat of the Big 12, giving No. 4 TCU all the Frogs could handle in a 34-30 battle in which Gary Patterson needed a 21-point third quarter to preserve victory, and No. 21 Duke lost to four-game winner Virginia Tech. No. 17 LSU lost to a four-win Arkansas.
It was a Saturday many BYU fans simply stayed home on a warm couch with remote control in hand. The announced attendance was 53,622 but I didn’t see that many aluminum seats covered by bodies.
You can paint Saturday’s BYU win over UNLV any way you want. It was expected, predicted and sorely needed to get BYU six victories. This is a team that believes it can get nine wins before Christmas.
The Cougars will kill Savannah State next week. Defeating Cal on the road may be too tall an order. In the bowl, BYU could face Cincinnati or East Carolina, and both have very effective pass attacks.
But one thing I do know: At the Miami Beach Bowl, it certainly will be warmer than Provo on this November night.
Dick Harmon, Deseret News sports columnist, can be found on Twitter as Harmonwrites and can be contacted at dharmon@desnews.com.