A Match up Made in Fiesta Bowl Heaven?

If you haven’t heard, this year’s Fiesta Bowl pits 10th-ranked Ohio State against third-ranked Texas. As Texas has shown, they are almost unstoppable; Ohio State has shown that once again they have a brick wall defense. What happens when an unstoppable force hits an immovable object? One Fiesta Bowl made in heaven.

The Texas Longhorns were an afterthought to Oklahoma and Texas Tech in the mighty Big XII South in the preseason however thanks to the Heisman-like play of Colt McCoy the Longhorns surprised the whole college football world.

Coming off of an 11-1 record and a win over one of the National Title contenders, the Texas Longhorns have every right to be angry. Texas should have had a shot at the Big XII Championship but because of the last second heroics of one Michael Crabtree and a lack of assistance from the computers, they ended up in the Fiesta Bowl for only the second time in school history, their first attempt ended in a thumping by Penn State 38-15.

Ohio State, on the other hand, had its fair share of ups and downs this season. After shutting out Youngstown State and losing their star tailback Beanie Wells the Buckeyes struggled to beat Ohio and then went on to lose to USC badly.

Then quarterback controversy began after Pryor performed much better than Todd Boeckman in the USC game; Pryor then took the team upon himself leading Ohio State to only one more loss against Big Ten rival Penn State in a thriller, finishing the season at 10-2. Ohio State, however, has done very well in the Fiesta Bowl, having an overall record of 4-1, their one loss coming to Penn State. The Buckeyes are 3-0 in the Fiesta Bowl under Jim Tressel which bodes well for Ohio State.

The Fiesta Bowl now marks the third time in four years that these two storied programs have taken the field against each other. The last game in 2006 ended in a 24-7 rout of Texas in Austin.

What makes this match up so special is the defense of Ohio State against the insanely explosive offense of the Texas Longhorns. Colt McCoy has been one of the most outstanding players this year, as he will be attending the Heisman Trophy presentation on Saturday; however, one thing he has not faced this season is a veteran defense that has a tremendous front seven and one of the best corners in the game Malcolm Jenkins.

However the same thing could be said about the Ohio State defense. They have not faced a quarterback with the versatility and toughness that Colt McCoy has, nor have they faced a core of talented receivers like the core at Texas.

You could argue that almost all bowl match ups are special, however this one is different. When you look at these two teams, what you have are teams that both have something to prove. Texas wants to go out and show that they deserve to be in the BCS National Championship Game. On the other side, Ohio State has gotten embarrassed in the past three years on the big stage, and they have taken a lot of heat for that. Ohio State wants to prove that they can play when the stage is bigger and when the lights are brighter. When you have two teams that are out to prove everyone wrong well something has got to give, and it will on January 5^th, 2009.