BOISE, Idaho — This Day In Sports…November 4, 2017:
In arguably the most diversified passing game performance in school history, Boise State thumps Nevada 41-14 on the blue turf. Quarterbacks Brett Rypien and Montell Cozart and wide receiver Cedrick Wilson combined for 339 yards through the air. The victory was the Broncos’ fifth straight—and their fifth in a row over the Wolf Pack. The team would go on to win the Mountain West championship and defeat Oregon in the Las Vegas Bowl.
What Rypien will be remembered for in this game is his receiving and rushing. He looked like Wilson on a spectacular 15-yard sideline catch from Wilson in the first quarter, taking the ball away from a Nevada cornerback. And Rypien did his best Alexander Mattison impression on a 14-yard quarterback draw to set up the final Boise State touchdown. But the conventional Rypien was pretty good, too, as he completed 74 percent of his throws for 258 yards and two touchdowns.
Wilson, meanwhile, was 2-for-2 for 46 yards, including a 31-yard strike to Cozart. (It was believed to be the first time in history that two Bronco quarterbacks have caught passes in the same game.) Cozart’s reception from Wilson was not your ordinary double-pass throwback to the QB. Usually you see the quarterback circle out into the flat on that play, but as soon as Cozart threw his backward pass to Wilson, he bolted right up the middle and gathered in the toss for the 31-yard gain.
The game didn’t start well, though. Nevada opened with a six minute, 15-second, punch-in-the-mouth 75-yard drive to take a 7-0 lead. Then the Wolf Pack pulled off another 75-yarder early in the second quarter to go up 14-10. But after that, Boise State yielded zero points and 138 yards to a team that had rolled up some big numbers the previous month. The Broncos had shown a penchant for mid-game adjustments that season, and it was evident in this one. Boise State picked off Pack quarterback Ty Gangi three times and held him to 160 yards passing on 37 attempts.
(Tom Scott hosts the Scott Slant segment during the football season on KTVB’s Sunday Sports Extra. He also anchors four sports segments each weekday on 95.3 FM KTIK and one on News/Talk KBOI. His Scott Slant column runs every Wednesday.)
