Rose Bowl presented by Vizio

Rose Bowl presented by Vizio

Tuesday January 1st, 14:00 PT (22:00 GMT)
Rose Bowl, Pasadena, California
Wisconsin Badgers vs. (6)Stanford Cardinals

The Rose Bowl is the oldest Bowl in college football first played in 1902 when the “Point-a-minute” Michigan Wolverines defeated the Stanford Cardinals 49-0. After that blow-out, the game wasn't held again until 1916 when Washington beat Brown. When the Rose Bowl Stadium opened in 1923, the game moved to it's current location and has been played on New Year's Day. The game moved in 1942 after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, with Oregon State holding off the heavily favored and undefeated Duke Blue Devils 20-6. When the BCS was created in 1998, the Rose Bowl entered into the rotation as the National Championship game the traditional Big-Ten champion vs PAC-12 champion match-up was lost, however when the BCS National Championship game was created, the Rose Bowl regained it's line-up and last year's game was the first Rose Bowl win since 1917.

Wisconsin sneaked into this game at 8-5 after crushing Nebraska in the Big-Ten Championship game 70-31 retaining their record as the only team to win the Championship game. Some would say they were lucky to reach that game as the Badgers finished behind Penn State and that Ohio State who were ineligible for the post-season. The Badgers lost to (13)Oregon State, (16)Nebraska and Michigan State while posting wins over Purdue and Minnesota. Their season looked to be a bust finishing with losses to the Suckeyes and Penn State, but they bounced by in style in their rematch with the Cornhuskers. Montee Ball led the offense finishing 7th in the nation with 1730 yards and 21 touchdowns. Danny O'Brien finished the season at quarterback after Joel Stave broke his collarbone in the overtime defeat to Michigan State. As you'd expect with such a rush-orientated offense, WR Jared Abbrederis only scored 5 TDs but picked up an impressive 793 considering the offensive play calling.

Stanford beat the pre-season number 1 ranked USC, but were immediately upset in Seattle by the Washington Huskies and a fortnight later, they went down 20-13 in overtime to (1)Notre Dame. At that point, Stanford was finished with losing. They finished with 7 straight wins and the final four of those were against ranked opponents including beating the then number 1 Oregon Ducks 17-14 after overtime in Eugene to end the year 11-2. There were initial fears that the Cardinals would suffer from a quarterback vacuum with Andrew Luck leaving for the Colts, but after replacing Josh Nunes, Kevin Hogan has led the Cardinals to an impressive winning streak and with TE Zach Ertz a big threat over the middle with 837 yards and 5 touchdowns, next year looks very bright in Palo Alto. The main focus of the attack has been Stepfan Taylor, the back has 1442 yards this year and 12 touchdowns behind one of the best offensive lines in the business. Defensively, Stanford are 3rd best in the country against the run, allowing a mere 87.7 yards per game and with Wisconsin's apparent inability to advance the ball through the air, that will be important, even if they have conceded 14 TDs on the ground.

FOR WISCONSIN TO WIN
They need to establish the run, they average less passing yards per game than Stanford does running. Montee Ball is going to the NFL as the all-time FBS touchdown leader. He put on a show for us in the Big-Ten Championship game and if the Badgers want to win this game, he has to be big again. Ball needs to touch the ball 30-35 times in order to carry this team to a win.

FOR STANFORD TO WIN
Run the ball and stuff Montee Ball. Ball blew apart the Nebraska defense in the Big-Ten championship game and although yards shouldn't be as easy to come by against this Cardinals team, he remains a huge danger to their first Rose Bowl win since 1972.

VERDICT
This should be an exhibition of running football and for the oldest bowl in the country, that seems apt that we should see two teams who enjoy and excel running the football. Ball can grab another 150+ yards and Taylor will respond with something similar, but at the end of this game, the difference will be between the offensive lines. I think Stanford has the edge and they should run out winners

ADVICE
Stanford -5.5
Over 47 points

DRINKING GAME
1 drink: A short field goal contains a reference to Tiger Woods
2 drinks: Anybody mentions the game played in Charlotte
Finish it: Ball and Taylor combine for 400 yards