Boxing Day is bowling day: Pitt and Utah State knock off MACtion

Length, in seconds, of the drive that put away the Poinsettia Bowl. Utah State’s offense, so limited in quarterback Chuckie Keeton’s absence, had tested the stout USU defense all night. The Aggies had limited NIU to a touchdown and two missed field goal attempts, but the offense had produced just 13 points and consecutive turnovers. Utah State was clinging to a 13-7 lead.

With 11:33 left in the game, however, the offense did its job. Against an increasingly demoralized NIU defense, the Aggies went 80 yards in 16 plays, converting three third downs, throwing only two passes, and scoring the clinching touchdown with 4:14 remaining.

In a low-scoring first half, Northern Illinois racked up 234 yards of offense, but penalties and key stops by the Utah State defense limited the Huskies to just a touchdown. Quarterback Jordan Lynch snuck in from a yard with eight minutes left in the half, canceling out two Utah State field goals and giving the Huskies a 7-6 halftime lead.

The Aggies put the game away with a 17-play, 80-yard drive that chopped 7:19 off the clock in the fourth quarter, capped off by a one-yard touchdown run by DeMartino for a 21-7 lead.

The Pittsburgh Panthers got a late field goal to take a back-and-forth Little Caesar’s Bowl 30-27 over Bowling Green Thursday night. The Panthers (7-6) finish with a winning record for the first time since 2010, while Bowling Green (10-4) become the sixth MAC team in the last seven years to lose in the Pizza Bowl.

The Panthers built a 17-3 first half lead, highlighted by a Tyler Boyd 54-yard punt return for a score, and it looked like Pitt could run away from Bowling Green. The Falcons got a 29-yard touchdown pass late in the half, though, which cut the Pitt lead down to seven points. Bowling Green returner BooBoo Gates then returned the second half’s opening kick 94 yards for a score, tying the game at 17. An exchange of field goals left the game tied at 20 entering the fourth quarter.

Despite what the image above shows, there were offsetting penalties on the play, and surprisingly, no ejections for either player. It was not immediately clear what the Pitt player may have done to provoke the attack, if anything.

• Bowl season TV schedule, with scores and recaps along the way

The Little Caesar Pizza Bowl has the word pizza in the name, and yet here we are. No pizza.

Worse still, the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl doesn’t even have a single piece of pizza visible on its official Instagram page! There is a critical lack of pizza here. Be yourself, Little Caesar Pizza Bowl. Embrace pizza.

(“Mid-major elite” obviously means something different now than it did a few years ago, when TCU and Utah were still mid-majors and Boise State had not yet fallen back to the pack.)

It would perhaps be more fun to watch both USU and NIU taking on major-conference teams of similar caliber -- Utah State ranks between Michigan and Ole Miss this season, while NIU falls in the Texas Tech or Cincinnati neighborhood -- but in the absence of that, a nice showcase of two solid mid-major programs isn’t a bad fall-back option.

I wrote that on December 10 after watching Bowling Green wreck Northern Illinois’ chances at a BCS bid, then lose its head coach to Wake Forest. Now-former head coach Dave Clawson put a hell of a product on the field this year, one that improved overall in 2013 despite regressing on defense.

The Falcons return to Detroit, this time behind interim head coach Adam Scheier. The BGSU team that played through the 2013 regular season was, on average, a decent amount better than its Pizza Bowl opponent, Pittsburgh. Will that be the case on Thursday?

Two of the best non-power conference teams in the country will square off in an early bowl game as Northern Illinois and Utah State will play in this year’s Poinsettia Bowl. Television coverage begins at 9:30 p.m. ET on ESPN.

Rankings and records: Northern Illinois is ranked No. 23. Utah State is unranked. Northern Illinois went 12-1, with an 8-0 conference record good for the division title. Utah State went 8-5, winning their division with a 7-1 conference record. Utah State won the only matchup between the two schools, way back in 1995.

Congratulations, Pittsburgh! You haven’t been sent to Birmingham this year! The Panthers went to the BBVA Compass Bowl in each of the last three seasons, and now they’ll get a welcome change of scenery. They’ll also get a tough matchup in Bowling Green, which is coming off a MAC championship.

The Panthers had their issues on the defensive side during the regular season, and that will be something to watch considering that Bowling Green is averaging 6.7 yards per play. The Falcons have an efficient passer and a quality running back, which makes them a challenging matchup.

The Aggies (Mountain West, 8-5 SU, 8-5 ATS, 6-7 OU) came up short in a 24-17 loss to Fresno State in the MWC Championship on December 7 as a 3-point road underdog. The Aggies covered in four of their last five games prior to this loss and the total has now stayed UNDER in their last four contests. They were 4-3 ATS in seven road games this year.

Northern Illinois (Mid-American, 12-1 SU, 8-5 ATS, 8-5 OU) climbed to No. 14 in the BCS rankings while posting a perfect 12-0 SU mark in the regular season, but it got its doors blown off by Bowling Green, 47-27, in the MAC Championship as a three-point favorite.

Pittsburgh finished the season an even .500 after posting just two straight-up victories in its last six games and will enter the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl as underdogs to Bowling Green.

The Panthers can take some solace in a trend that has seen underdogs cover the Little Caesars Bowl odds five times in the past six seasons. They opened as six-point underdogs to the Falcons, who are projected to win big by the Odds Shark college football computer.