2011 Bowl Predictions: Rose, Fiesta and Orange Bowls Will See QBs Lead the Way

'Tis the season to go bowling, and this year is serving up a delicious buffet of star quarterback matchups. 

No offense to Alabama and LSU, but the offensive fireworks that will be on display in many games are much preferred over the defensive battle that the Tigers and Tide will wage on each other. 

Offense is about quarterbacks, and here are three games where the best of the best will put on brilliant shows for the ages.    

Fiesta Bowl

The Andrew Luck vs. Brandon Weeden showdown in the desert

The Fiesta Bowl leadership is licking its chops to get this matchup. 

Neither Stanford nor Oklahoma State would be in this game without their incredible quarterbacks. Luck and Weeden are both special players, but more importantly, they are amazing leaders. They literally will their teams to victory every Saturday.

On the season, Luck passed for 3,170 yards with 35 touchdowns and just nine interceptions. His favorite target is Coby Fleener, who caught 10 TDs while gaining 648 yards. 

Weeden passed for 4,328 yards with 45 touchdowns and 12 interceptions. His main target is Justin Blackmon, who caught 15 touchdowns while gaining 1,336 yards. 

Good luck to the defensive staffs in trying to find any weaknesses in Luck and Weeden—neither player had a game this year that they could point to as the blueprint for slowing either player down.

The key for both defenses will be simply limiting the amount of big plays. 

Favorite:  Weeden

Orange Bowl

Clemson’s Tajh Boyd vs. West Virginia’s Geno Smith

Against Virginia Tech in the ACC Championship game, Boyd showed everyone that his first eight games of the season were more of a true reflection of his abilities than the last four.

Definitely slumping coming into the title game, Boyd put on a clinic, passing for 240 yards with three touchdowns and rushing for another touchdown while leading the Tigers to a dominating 38-10 win over the Hokies. 

The Mountaineers were the last team standing in the lowly Big East to earn the conference’s BCS bowl bid, but they would be heading to the dust bowl instead of the Orange Bowl without Smith. 

Smith finished the regular season passing for 3,978 yards with 25 touchdowns and just seven interceptions. Look no further than his performance against LSU on September 24 as proof of his gifted abilities.

The Tigers’ defense allowed 166 yards passing per game this year and yielded only seven passing touchdowns. Smith passed for 463 yards and two touchdowns against them.

Everyone seems to be casting off the Orange Bowl, but they may want to re-think their opinion. 

Clemson and West Virginia are not sexy picks, but they do play a thrilling brand of football.  Watching Smith and Boyd go blow-for-blow will be exciting. 

Favorite:  Boyd

Rose Bowl

Wisconsin’s Russell Wilson vs. Oregon’s Darron Thomas

The Rose Bowl is getting two of the most dynamic quarterbacks in college football, which will help it live up to its nickname as the “Granddaddy of Them All.” 

It is easy to understand why many point to Montee Ball as the primary reason why the Wisconsin Badgers are the Big Ten champions for the second straight year. Gaining 1,759 yards with 32 touchdowns certainly supports their argument.

Nonetheless, it is Wilson who is the key reason for the Badgers’ success.

He passed for 2,879 yards with 31 touchdowns—phenomenal on its own—but he threw just three interceptions. That is an astonishing statistic. 

Wilson forced opponents to honestly defend the Badgers instead of loading up the box to stop Ball. If Joe Brennan were the Badger quarterback, Wisconsin’s season would have been much different. 

Considering that he leads the nation’s sixth-ranked offense, it is startling that Darron Thomas flies under the radar, but the reason is because he does a lot of little things so well instead of one or two big things right. 

On the season, he passed for 2,493 yards with 30 touchdowns and just six interceptions. Those are great stats, but his best accomplishment was keeping the Ducks moving forward after the embarrassing 40-27 loss to LSU to open the season.

That loss could have derailed the season. Thomas kept his team together, and helped lead them to their third straight Pac-12 title. 

Favorite:  Wilson

There is no question that LSU and Alabama will give us a game on January 9.  Defense wins championships, but it is not very appealing. Offense firepower is more desirable, and the Fiesta, Rose and Orange Bowls will deliver.