Back to Normal: Penn State Wins Wild One : Holiday Bowl: Reviving the game’s strange and high-scoring tradition, the Nittany Lions use an opportunistic defense to put away Ty Detmer and BYU, 50-39.

Proving true the old adage that there is more than one way to skin a cat, the Nittany Lions of Penn State and the Cougars of Brigham Young met in the 12th annual Holiday Bowl Friday night in a game of contrasting styles.

The Lions’ idea was to beat the Cougars with their running game and a strong defense. The Cougars’ plan against the Lions was to live and die by the pass.

The Lions’ way won, though barely. They used the running of All-American tailback Blair Thomas and a defense that yielded a school-record 576 yards passing to BYU quarterback Ty Detmer but found a way to stop BYU when it mattered the most. The result was a 50-39 victory in front of a sellout crowd 61,113 at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium.

Thomas gained 186 yards and scored one touchdown on a Holiday Bowl-record 35 carries. That earned him a share of the offensive player of the game award with Detmer.

Detmer completed 42 of 59 passes for 576 yards and two touchdowns and two interceptions. He also ran for two touchdowns in a performance that was as spectacular as Thomas’ was relentless. The attempts and completions both were bowl records.

But the difference was two bizarre plays that will go down among the wildest in Holiday Bowl, if not college football, history.

The first was a failed BYU conversion pass with 2:34 remaining that Penn State linebacker Andre Collins returned 102 yards for two points, the first time that has happened in a bowl game under a two-year-old NCAA rule.

The second came less than two minutes later when, with BYU driving for a shot at a go-ahead touchdown, Detmer was stripped of the ball by hero back Gary Brown as he attempted to pass. Brown then raced 53 yards for a touchdown with 45 seconds left, closing out the Cougars (10-3).

Those unusual twists were a fitting return to form for the Holiday Bowl after Oklahoma State’s uncharacteristic 62-14 rout over Wyoming. It was the tenth time in its 12-year history that the game came down to the final minutes.

“This was the screwiest game I’ve ever been involved in, and we’ve had our share,” BYU Coach LaVell Edwards said. “I thought we were going to win it at the end, right up until Gary Brown’s play.”

The teams combined for 1,115 yards in total offense with the Cougars gaining 651. Penn State’s 50 points was its most since a 56-18 over William & Mary in 1984 and its most ever in a bowl game. With those kinds of numbers, it was no wonder that the selection committee opted against picking defensive players of the game, choosing instead to have co-offensive players. But that does not mean the Lions did have some worthy nominations.

Collins and Brown qualified for shear dramatics, but free safety Sherrod Rainge made his mark with two interceptions and a break-up of a Detmer pass intended for tight end Chris Smith as he streaked toward the end zone with 57 seconds left.

There also was a Holiday Bowl-record 51-yard field goal by Penn State senior Ray Tarasi.

That it came down to a final harried minutes was testament to the skill of Detmer and the BYU passing attack.

Penn State (8-3-1) appeared ready to tuck the game away when split end Dave Daniels and quarterback Tony Sacca completed a 52-yard touchdown pass play that gave the Lions a 41-26 lead with 9:28 left.

But BYU answered quickly with three Detmer completions for 67 yards to set up a one-yard touchdown run by fullback Fred Whittingham that cut the lead to 41-33 with 8:51 remaining.

After forcing Penn State to punt, the Cougars lauched another scoring drive. This ended with Detmer’s three-yard pass to wide receiver Brent Nyberg with 2:34 to play to pull BYU within 41-39. The Cougars lined up for a two-point conversion that would have tied the game at 41-41, but Collins stepped in front of a Detmer pass intended for split end Andy Boyce and set off a dash down the left sideline that would make bowl history.

BYU still had one more chance, but that ended when a blitzing Brown jumped Detmer, wrested the ball away and dashed to the end zone with much of a celebrating Penn State bench in tow.

It was a crazy end to a game that had the promise of something different.

The school colors are the same--blue and white; the mascots are from the same animal family and the schools both sit in snowy mountain valleys, but when it comes to football, these universities hail from two entirely different schools.

That was clear from their respective opening series: BYU started by passing on all nine plays in its drive; Penn State opened by running nine times in 12 plays, with Thomas carrying on eight.

In a near-perfect reverse image, the Cougars would end with 59 passes and 23 rushes to the Lions’ 21 passes and 54 rushes.

But not all went to form in this one. The Cougars and Edwards are supposed to be the ones known for offensive innovation and trickery. But it was the Lions and their coach, Joe Paterno, who pulled the biggest risk with a successful fake punt that set up the second of two touchdown runs by fullback Leroy Thompson.

And while both teams and coaches have national reputations for running clean programs manned with clean-cut student athletes, the game featured 20 penalties for 181 yards. Five of those were for unsportsmanlike conduct or personal fouls.

The touch of roughhouse, combined with the contrast in offensive styles, added to the impression of the game as mirror of the Lions’ memorable 1987 Fiesta Bowl victory over Miami and its Heisman Trophy quarterback, Vinny Testaverde. But while that game was for the national championship, this one was limited to determining if No. 18 Penn State was better than No. 19 BYU. The stakes might have been lower, but not the show.

The first half was as tense as the second, with the teams taking turns exchanging the lead. All that separated the teams was a missed extra point on Penn State’s only first-half touchdown that allowed the Cougars to cling to a 13-12 lead.

The Lions scored first on a 30-yard field goal by Tarasi with 7:11 left in the first quarter.

The Cougars tied the game at 3-3 just before the end of the quarter on a 20-yard field by senior Jason Chaffetz. Penn State answered on its next series with the game’s first touchdown--a 24-yard pass to flanker Terry Smith from Sacca with 13:20 left in the half.

The play was almost too easy to believe as Smith lined up uncovered on the wide side and just stepped across the the left edge of the goal-line before right cornerback Brian Mitchell could recover to make the tackle.

But the lead stayed at 9-3 when Tarasi’s extra-point try flew wide right.

BYU came back on its next possession to drive for its lone touchdown of the half. The Cougars went 68 yards in 12 plays for the score.

Three times Demter kept the drive alive by completing passes on third and six or more. Twice he went to Nyberg for gains of 14 and 24 yards and once to Smith for nine yards.

Detmer then added the final touch when he faked a dive over the line to halfback Stacey Corley, put the ball on his hip and ran a bootleg right one yard into the end zone. Chaffetz added the extra point for a 10-9 lead with 8:00 left in the second quarter.

The Lions went back on top, 12-10, on their next possession on Tarasi’s 36-yard field goal with 2:01 to halftime. But this was a game in which no lead was safe for long.

The Cougars took over from at the their 25 after the kickoff, and Detmer immediately found halfback Matt Bellini wide open at the BYU 46. Bellini caught the pass and ran to the Penn State 24 before being tackled for a 51-yard gain.

But after reaching the Penn State four, the Cougars had to settle for Chaffetz’s 22-yard field goal and a 13-12 halftime lead when Detmer’s third-and-one pass intended for Bellini sailed out of the end zone.

The attendance of 61,113 was the third highest in Holiday Bowl history, just short of the record 61,892 set in the 1987 game between Iowa and Wyoming.