Story by Alan Snel Photos by Hugh Byrne
The Northwestern and Utah players got to see Las Vegas magician Mat Franco at a show and play in a splendid and palatial NFL stadium Saturday.
But there was no need to open the upper bowl of Allegiant Stadium. And by the looks of this crowd of red-clad Utah Utes fans and some Northwestern fans dressed in purple and filling only a few lower bowl sections, they probably did not have to close the Hacienda Avenue bridge to car traffic to allow fans to walk from Mandalay Bay to the domed, 62,500-seat stadium.
From eyeballing the number of fans in seats, the SRS Distribution Las Vegas Bowl crowd looked smaller than most UNLV football game crowds this season. And let’s face it — there was just not the juice in the building for a prime-time college bowl game.
John Saccenti, the bowl game’s executive director, did the best he could to promote a game matching a team that won the Pac-12 championship game in this very stadium in 2021 and 2022 and a team from the Midwest that fired its coach earlier this year amid hazing allegations. Northwestern ended up hiring David Braun as the fulltime coach. Braun ended winning the Big Ten’s coach of the year, plus the national newcomer coach of the year for steering Northwestern to a 7-5 record and to this game in Las Vegas.
On paper, the move of the Las Vegas Bowl from old Sam Boyd Stadium near the Las Vegas Wetlands to swanky Allegiant Stadium just west of the Strip seemed like a step up in stature for the ESPN-owned bowl game that provides the sports network with built-in prime-time TV programming.
But in last year’s game, it was apparent that the Florida Gators were not overjoyed about being in this bowl game and it showed in a loss to Oregon State. Florida finished with only six wins out of 13 games.
The Las Vegas Bowl now is held against the backdrop of a much more busy and competitive sports market. It was created by Las Vegas tourism and hotel folks to fill a gap before Christmas. But with the NHL Golden Knights, NFL Raiders and minor league sports like the NBA G League Ignite and the minor league hockey Silver Knights providing sports options, the bowl game is not exactly packing in the locals.
What can infuse the Las Vegas Bowl with more attendance and buzz is if the game can somehow convince the new College Football Playoff to use Allegiant Stadium/ Las Vegas Bowl to host one of the first round games of college football’s new 12-team playoff that starts in 2024. Right now, the first round games are played at the stadiums of the higher seeded teams before the quarters, semis and finals are held at major bowl game venues.
Allegiant Stadium has proven it can be an effective neutral site college football location with games such as Notre Dame vs BYU in October 2022 and the USC vs LSU game during Labor Day weekend of 2024.
Today’s college football game was not exactly a masterpiece.
Northwestern led Utah, 7-0, in the middle of the third quarter, as the Utes had piled up a measly 71 yards and turned the ball over three times to Northwestern at the time.
The Las Vegas Bowl game will need to change simply because its annual participating conference — the Pac-12 — has crumbled as ten of the 12 member universities moved to other football conferences.
The Pac-12 team in the Las Vegas Bowl used to play a rotating representative from either the Big Ten like Northwestern today or the SEC like Florida in 2022.
It would be hard to not have a more riveting game at the Las Vegas Bowl in 2024.
Utah tied Northwestern at 7-7 with a score in the second half and the two teams were battling it out midway through the fourth quarter.
A Northwestern touchdown pass gave the Big Ten team a 14-7 win and made alums like Michael Wilbon a happy Las Vegas visitor.