BOISE, Idaho — Merle and Ruth Baptiste have been Boise State season ticket holders since 1974, when the Broncos were still competing in Division II. They were there when the program won the Division I-AA national championship in 1980, made its first bowl game, the Humanitarian Bowl, in 1999, and won its first BCS bowl in 2006.
On a chilly Friday night at Albertson’s Stadium, they saw their new first game. Boise State has qualified for a major college football national championship. If the Broncos win 21-7 against UNLV, no. 10 Boise State (12-1) will automatically advance to the first 12 teams in the College Football Playoff.
“It’s time.” Merle said. “We should have been in the (national) championship a long time ago, but we got snubbed by the big schools.”
The importance of this moment cannot be overstated, not only for Boise State, but for college football. This is a sport that operates forever as a country club, offering lifetime memberships to Notre Dame or Alabama and visitor passes to Tulane or Western Michigan. During the BCS days, the powers that be were taken to parliament and threatened with an anti-trust investigation for so blatantly excluding half the sports from the party.
Go deeper
Boise State, Ashton Jeanty steamroll UNLV to win MWC, closes CFP bid
A generation later, when the commissioners created a new 12-team playoff, they finally secured a spot for the little guy. It’s fitting that the first five-person group program utilized was one of the original giant killers.
“It would have been great if there had been playoffs. I felt like I could play with anybody,” said Jared Zabransky, quarterback of Boise State’s undefeated 2006 Fiesta Bowl team. “It should have been that way for a long time. “I’m just grateful that these kids now have the opportunity to do that.”
Headlined by Heisman prospect Ashton Jeanty, the kids captured their second straight Mountain West championship Friday when Jeanty broke off a 75-yard touchdown run for his sixth 200-yard game of the season (209). Afterwards, all 36,663 fans at a sold-out Albertson’s Stadium took to the green grass.
“Hope is powerful,” Boise State Athletic Director Jeremiah Dickey said. “From a college football fan’s perspective, you’ve seen it all year long: When you give them more opportunities, it really catches fire.”
Boise State fans were so excited that they tore down the goal posts and dumped them into the nearby Boise River. They were part of history. Never before had a five-man team left the stadium knowing they were in the playoffs. Even if Cincinnati is undefeated in 2021, we can’t be sure until the committee makes its final ruling.
“This is a huge opportunity for any school,” Boise State coach Spencer Danielson said. “As a competitor, all you want is opportunity.”
Zabransky and Ian Johnson never got a chance to play in the national championship despite finishing as the only undefeated team in the country that season. Three years later, Kellen Moore and Doug Martin also failed to make a 14-0 team. Dan Hawkins coached a Boise team that went undefeated in the 2004 regular season and advanced to the Liberty Bowl. The same goes for the undefeated Chris Petersen team that went to the Poinsettia Bowl in 2008.
Danielson and Jeanty are the latest in a long line of coaches and players who have led Boise State’s decades-long progression from junior college to low-level NCAA school, FBS and national power. In the early 2010s, the Broncos regularly beat the likes of Georgia, Oklahoma, Oregon, and Virginia Tech. They reached three Fiesta Bowls and won all three. But they haven’t been asked to join a power conference like fellow BCS busters Utah and TCU.
The program then stagnated for about a decade, still regularly winning 10 or 11 games a year and winning a few Mountain West championships, but the breakout seasons UCF had in 2017-18 and Cincinnati in 2020-21. There never was. Both teams received call-ups, along with Houston, UCF, and SMU.
Just 13 months ago, Boise State was 5-5 and in danger of its first losing season since 1997. At the time, Dickey made the surprising decision to fire third-year coach Andy Avalos, a former Broncos linebacker, after the team had won 10 games a year. Earlier. Dickey promoted Danielson, then a 35-year-old defensive coordinator, with full plans for an outside hire after the season.
That is, until Danielson’s team won the next three games and advanced to the Mountain West championship game, where they defeated UNLV, making Danielson a regular.
With Jeanty returning after a 1,347-yard season, Boise was named the conference winner in the preseason but was rarely considered a frontrunner to advance to the CFP. The Broncos didn’t appear in the AP poll for the first time until Sept. 22, a few weeks after going to Eugene and putting No. 7 Oregon on the line. After rushing for 267 yards and six touchdowns in the team’s opener at Georgia Southern, Jeanty began garnering Heisman attention early on. But there was little chance that the quintet of running backs would actually arrive in New York.
Three months later, Jeanty had more rushing yards (2,497) in the regular season than any player in history other than Barry Sanders. The only question now is whether it was enough to earn Colorado two-way sensation Travis Hunter a trophy.
“He’s showing every week that he’s the best soccer player in the country, and I don’t think he comes close,” Danielson said.
Jeanty is reason enough for Power 4 playoff teams to be wary of having Boise State as their opponent. Barring a surprise move from the committee on Sunday, the Broncos will likely not earn a top-four seed and advance to the quarterfinals. For geographic reasons, it will likely be placed in the Fiesta Bowl on December 31st. If Clemson upsets SMU in the ACC Championship, Boise could move up to a No. 3 seed.
As a No. 4 seed, that would make for an attractive matchup with a No. 5 seed who would either lose in the Big Ten or SEC Championship Game or lose to Notre Dame 11-1.
“Good luck to anyone who thinks they’re going to win (against Boise State),” UNLV coach Barry Odom said. “I think they’re one of the best teams in college football right now. And I think they will do a great job representing this conference. They are made to run.”
They’ve done it before. Boise wasn’t nearly as respected in the program as it is today when Zabransky handed it off to Johnson to take down a top Bob Stoops Oklahoma team on the famous Statue of Liberty play. A top-10 team, Virginia Tech, which the Broncos won in the 2010 season opener, won the ACC that season. The Georgia team they knocked off in the 2011 season opener won 10 games and won the SEC East.
But winning the College Football Playoff quarterfinals would be a signature accomplishment for Boise State. This is the football equivalent of early Gonzaga NCAA tournament teams that helped establish that program as a new-age blueblood.
“This team wanted to leave a legacy where your actions can have a big impact for years to come,” Danielson said. “Standing on the podium and seeing Bronco Nation flock to the stadium is a moment that can change everything.”
For Boise State and college football.
(Boise Head Coach Spencer Danielson Photo by Loren Orr / Getty Images)
