Arizona to Take on Nebraska in Holiday Bowl
The No. 22 Arizona Wildcats (8-4) will be in a battle of Top 25 teams on Dec. 30 in the Holiday Bowl, when they take on the No. 20 Nebraska Cornhuskers (9-4) in San Diego, California.
This exact matchup took place 11 years ago at the Holiday Bowl in 1998, where Arizona managed to rally to beat Nebraska, 23-20.
The Wildcats accepted their bid to the Holiday Bowl one day after finishing their regular season with an 21-17 upset of then-No. 20 USC on the road, which snapped the Wildcats’ seven-game losing streak to the Trojans.
Arizona started the season off decently well under coach Mike Stoops, winning their first two games before losing on the road to Iowa (who would finish the season ranked 10th in the country). They also dropped games to Washington, California, and eventual Pac-10 champion Oregon.
But the win over the Trojans catapulted Arizona back into the Top 25, and sealed second place in the Pac-10 up for the Arizona Wildcats, who finished with their best season in a decade.
Knowing that the Holiday Bowl planned on choosing the winner between Arizona/USC, the Wildcats had a little extra motivation to pull out the huge road win.
“With such a big bowl on the line, and a finish of anywhere from second to sixth [in the Pac-10], it was a big thing for us,” Stoops said. “It’s been like this all year. I’ve never seen a year like this. … I don’t know if we have the best players, but we’re awfully good if we’re balanced.”
They’ll meet a Nebraska squad hungry for revenge, after nearly upsetting Texas in the Big-12 championship on Saturday night and nearly thwarting the Longhorns’ national championship dreams. Instead, the Longhorns kicked a last second field goal to seal their place against Alabama, and Nebraska was left to wonder how the major upset got away.
With two teams who beat (or nearly beat) such traditional powers during the season, the Holiday Bowl should likely kick off the bowl season with a bang, one day after No. 18 Oregon State meets No. 14 BYU.
