12-26
vs Bowling Green Falcons in the Quick Lane Bowl at Ford Field Detroit
Fans were excited about the possibility of the Aggies going to the Arizona Bowl again, or even better, the
New Mexico Bowl in Albuquerque. However, NMSU’s
agreements with those bowl game had lapsed.
It would have been another great showing by Aggie fans at either of
those games.
Going into this game, the Aggies had lost their punter, Josh Carlson, to the transfer portal to
go to ASU. This was a little puzzling, though perhaps
not given the opposition (more on that later).
He was did a good job here.
Thankfully, the team didn’t lose any other main starters. The other issue was Diego Pavia. Apparently his
pulled hamstring (that’s what it seemed to be) was worse than we were
told. Luckily, he had three weeks to
rest it. They said on the broadcast he
was 90%. (And Bowling Green would have been in real trouble if he’d been 100%.)
Ron came over to my apartment and brought his laptop to
watch the game on. The official watch
party was at Rudy’s Barbeque. The theater at the mall next door was showing
the game for free. Buffalo Wild Wings, also next door, and a bunch of other
restaurants in town were certainly showing it, too. But never mind, Ron wanted to watch at my
apartment with no meal or snacks.
My main preparation for the game was rushing down to my
dad’s apartment to get the Aggie throw pillow he got me for Christmas. I’d forgotten it there yesterday. (He also got me an Aggie rain poncho. I sort of hope I won’t be using it.) I asked if he wanted to come over and watch,
and he grumbled that the Aggies didn’t deserve to be in a bowl and he wouldn’t
watch. Fine. Back at home, I listened to the pregame show on
the radio. I was tempted to listen to
the local game call with the ESPN
video, but radio reception wasn’t great and syncing with the video would have
been an issue.
There was a quick TV pregame that we missed. The crowd at Ford Field was excellent.
The weather in Detroit had been terrible, as a blizzard engulfed much of
the nation, but thankfully not us in southern New Mexico. Outdoor activities for the team were limited before
the game. Indoors, there was no problem
with the weather.
Bowling Green is only an hour from Detroit, so they made
up most of the 23,000 in attendance. There
were Aggie fans there. NMSU was also selling
commemorative tickets. The university
would give away the seats to kids for the game.
AD Mario Moccia said they would
likely be losing considerable money sending the team, the spirit squads, and
the band to the game, but it was worth it for the publicity. They ran at least four NMSU commercials
during the game. In addition, they got Pistol Pete on camera. If that doesn’t promote the university, what
will?
First
Quarter
Defensive star, Trevor
Brohard, picked a great time for his first college interception. On BG’s first series, Brohard came up
big. Quarterback Diego Pavia took over
from there. He hit Justice Powers for 42 yards on a third and long and Pavia ran on another
third and 9. Diego then hit Star Thomas for the touchdown. 7-0 Aggies.
I’d hate to put this as the pivotal play of the game, but
on BG’s next series, their quarterback, Matt
McDonald was hit by Dylan Early
after he’d stepped out of bounds on a keeper.
At best I can say is that Early had his head down and might not have
seen him go out, but it looked like a cheap shot. McDonald flipped over and hit his head on the
sidelines. He came out the game, not to
return. There was a sad scene later when
McDonald’s father was consoling him on the sidelines. Even with the penalty, the BG drive stalled with
the backup in, including a sack. A
51-yard field goal missed.
Second
Quarter
BG got some revenge on the next Aggie series. Pavia scrambled up the middle for the first down
and took a cheap hit by Chris Bacon while
taking a slide. The penalty helped the
drive. Pavia found Eric Marsh on a short pass for a touchdown to make it 14-0. BG came back with another drive and a missed
field goal from 40 yards out. Late in
the half, Pavia was intercepted throwing on fourth down on the BG side of the
field. It was Bacon again making the
play. Pavia came off limping, but was
okay for the rest of the game.
Third
Quarter
The Aggies first possession of the second half featured Jonathan Brady making a great 37-yard rush. Dear God, Pavia was blocking for him downfield. This young man was going to do whatever to
win today. Ethan Albertson hit a 35-yard field goal to make it 17-0
Aggies.
The joy was short-lived.
Ta’ron Keith ran back the short
kickoff 75 yards for a touchdown, 17-7.
I could hear Coach Kill groaning
from here. I had listened to an
interview with him before the game and he’d obsessed over special team’s
play. He’d blamed a couple of previous
bowl losses squarely on kicking issues.
Later in the quarter, Ahmonte
Watkins blew through the BG line for 45-yard touchdown run to make it 24-7. The Coach probably felt a little better.
Fourth
Quarter
The final act of this drama started with 49-yard BG field
goal to make it 24-10. (BG did lose a
player on the drive. He was ejected for
taunting, which involved grabbing the other player’s face mask.) The Aggies started playing conservative on
offense and gave the ball right back. On
BG’s next drive, Brohard forced a fumble, but it was recovered by BG. A couple of plays later in the red zone, Chris Ojoh forced another fumble,
recovered by Syrus Dumas.
The Aggie offense was once again a bit tentative, which
resulted in a punt from their own endzone.
I should mention here that Bowling Green has nation-leading
kick-blocking unit. (Maybe this is why
Carlson dipped out of this game.) Davion Daniels broke through and
blocked the punt. George Eberle, who I hadn’t heard of before this game, did have the
presence of mind to fall on the ball for a safety, rather than allowing a
touchdown. 24-12 and BG would be getting
the ball back. An assistant coach
wrestled a pistol away from Coach Kill, who was pointing it as his own head.
BG backup QB, Camden
Orth, led the Falcons to a quick touchdown to make it 24-19. The Aggies got the ball back with 6:27 left
on the clock. BG had all three timeouts. The Aggies went conservative again on their
play calling. What happened? BG never got the ball back. The Aggies converted on four third downs, two
of them were long. Pavia ran for three
of them. (He even fumbled the ball on
one of the runs, but recovered it.) Ron
and I were barely breathing while watching these clutch plays.
Aggies
win 24-19! Diego Pavia was your MVP. His stats weren’t overwhelming only because
they don’t measure heart. Coach Kill got
first bowl win in six attempts. I did
not know that he was winless in bowls before the game. I also looked up the odds afterward. Bowling Green was only a 3.5 point favorite. It was a pretty even match up. The Aggies are only FBS team undefeated in bowl
games at 4-0-1. However the main stat I
kept hearing was 0-4, which was how the team started their season.
I called dad to rub it in.
He was down at the river and had been listening to the game on the
radio. He was glad for the win. Ron had tried to be cool while watching the
game and had said, “Oh, they’re going to give it away,” but he was jumping up
and cheering on big plays and diving for loose balls like I was. We were both drained at the end of the game
during that last drive. There was barely
a “Yay!” It was mostly a “Whew!”
There was no postgame.
ESPN dumped it off on to ESPN+. Like there was anything else going on today
in sports. (There wasn’t. This was the only bowl game.) I flipped back on the radio, but there weren’t
any postgame interviews there either. I
had to get those later off of the team Twitter.
Ron and I took off for KFC
for chicken sandwiches, which were great and tasted even better with a side of
victory.
Lastly, my dad got this great New Mexico Christmas card
from a friend this year, who also gave me an Albuquerque Isotopes shirt.
I thought this would be a nice way to end the post.
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