The 1971 Fiesta Bowl was the inaugural

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of the

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bowl game In North America, a bowl game is one of a number of post-season college football games that are primarily played by teams belonging to the NCAA's Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). For most of its history, the Division I Bowl Subdivis ...

, played at

Sun Devil Stadium Sun Devil Stadium is an outdoor college football stadium in the southwestern United States, on the campus of Arizona State University (ASU) in Tempe, Arizona. It is home to the ASU Sun Devils football team of the Pac-12 Conference. The s ...

Tempe, Arizona , settlement_type = City , named_for = Vale of Tempe , image_skyline = Tempeskyline3.jpg , imagesize = 260px , image_caption = Tempe skyline as se ...

, on Monday, December 27. Part of the 1971–72 bowl game season, it featured the eighth-ranked

Arizona State Sun Devils The Arizona State Sun Devils are the athletic teams that represent Arizona State University. ASU has nine men's and eleven women's varsity teams competing at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I level as a member o ...

of the

Western Athletic Conference The Western Athletic Conference (WAC) is an NCAA Division I conference. The WAC covers a broad expanse of the western United States with member institutions located in Arizona, California, New Mexico, Utah, Washington (state), Washington, and Texa ...

(WAC) and the

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Florida State Seminoles The Florida State Seminoles are the athletic teams representing Florida State University located in Tallahassee, Florida. They compete as a member of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I level (Football Bowl Subdivis ...

. Arizona State broke a tie late in the fourth quarter to win, 45–38.

Background

The Fiesta Bowl had been created as a bowl game for the Western Athletic Conference (WAC) champion to participate in, the first to take place for the 1971 season.

Teams

Arizona State

The Sun Devils won their third consecutive WAC title (with an undefeated conference record for the second time in three years). The previous season, ASU won the

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, their first bowl appearance in two decades.

Florida State

Florida State was an independent in Coach Jones' first year at the program. A 5–0 start had made the Seminoles ranked #19, but later losses to

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

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, and

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knocked them out of the polls. This was Florida State's first bowl appearance in three years, as they looked for their first bowl win since January

1965 Events January–February * January 14 – The Prime Minister of Northern Ireland and the Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland meet for the first time in 43 years. * January 20 ** Lyndon B. Johnson is Second inauguration of Lyndo ...

Game summary

The game kicked off shortly after 1 p.m.

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, and was televised by

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. Calvin Demery started the scoring when he caught a touchdown pass from

Danny White Wilford Daniel White (born February 9, 1952) is a former quarterback and punter for the Dallas Cowboys and an American football coach in the Arena Football League. He has been the color commentator for Cowboys games on Compass Media Networks' ...

to give ASU an early lead, but Florida State would tie the game with a Paul Magalski touchdown run and take the lead later in the quarter with a field goal. Woody Green took the lead back for the Sun Devils with his touchdown run in the second quarter, but FSU added a field goal to narrow the lead to one. Later in the quarter, Rhett Dawson caught a pass from Kent Gaydos (normally the wide receiver) for a touchdown to give the Seminoles the lead again, with a successful conversion attempt to make it 21–14. But the Sun Devils tied the game with a Steve Holden touchdown catch from White to make it tied at 21–21. Dawson caught another touchdown, this time from quarterback

Gary Huff Gary Earl Huff (born April 27, 1951 in Natchez, Mississippi) is a former professional football player. He graduated from Leto Senior High School in Tampa, Florida and played college football and baseball at Florida State University before beco ...

, to give the Seminoles the lead again, and the Sun Devils went into halftime down 28–21. Arizona State started off small in the second half with an Eckstrand field goal, but later in the quarter Green put the Sun Devils ahead on his second touchdown run. Florida State tied the game with a Frank Fontes field goal in the fourth quarter. Later in the quarter, Florida State punted the ball to Holden, who returned it 58 yards for a touchdown to give Arizona State the lead 38–31. Dawson caught his third touchdown of the day to tie the game at 38. With 4:44 to play after the kickoff, the Sun Devils needed to score to win the game while giving the Noles little time, which they did as Green ran for his third touchdown of the day to give the Arizona State the lead with 34 seconds left. The Seminoles could not muster any more magic as the Sun Devils won their second consecutive bowl game and the first Fiesta Bowl. Woody Green went 101 yards on 24 carries and caught 2 passes for 41 yards for ASU, though FSU's Huff was named Offensive MVP, throwing 25 of 46 yards for 347 yards, throwing two touchdowns and interceptions.

Statistics

: :

Aftermath

It took six years and the firing of two coaches before the Seminoles returned to another bowl game, which they did under

Bobby Bowden Robert Cleckler Bowden (; November 8, 1929 – August 8, 2021) was an American college football coach. Bowden coached the Florida State Seminoles of Florida State University (FSU) from 1976 to 2009 and is considered one of the greatest college ...

. This was their last Fiesta Bowl until 1988. The Sun Devils went to two straight Fiesta Bowls while winning two more WAC titles and ultimately five in the 1970s. The schools would next play in the 1979 regular season, and would next meet in a bowl game in the 2019 Sun Bowl.

References

External links

Fiesta Bowl
– December 27, 1971 {{Florida State Seminoles bowl game navbox

Fiesta Bowl The Fiesta Bowl is an American college football bowl game played annually in the Phoenix metropolitan area. From its beginning in 1971 until 2006, the game was hosted at the Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe, Arizona. Since 2007, the game has been playe ...

Fiesta Bowl Arizona State Sun Devils football bowl games Florida State Seminoles football bowl games December 1971 sports events in the United States