The 2022 Fiesta Bowl was a

college football College football is gridiron football that is played by teams of amateur Student athlete, student-athletes at universities and colleges. It was through collegiate competition that gridiron football American football in the United States, firs ...

bowl game In North America, a bowl game, or simply bowl, is one of a number of postseason college football games primarily played by NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) teams. For most of its history, the FBS did not use a playoff tourname ...

played on January 1, 2022, with kickoff at 1:00p.m. EST or 11:00 a.m. locally televised on

ESPN ESPN (an initialism of their original name, which was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by the Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Commu ...

. It was the 51st edition of the

Fiesta Bowl The Fiesta Bowl is an annual American college football bowl game played annually in the Phoenix metropolitan area since 1971. From its beginning until 2006, the game was hosted at Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe, Arizona. Since 2007, the game has be ...

, and was one of the 2021–22 bowl games concluding the 2021 FBS football season. After rallying from a 28–7 deficit late in the 2nd quarter,

Oklahoma State Oklahoma State University (informally Oklahoma State or OSU) is a public land-grant research university in Stillwater, Oklahoma, United States. The university was established in 1890 under the legislation of the Morrill Act. Originally known ...

defeated Notre Dame 37–35. Sponsored by video game brand

PlayStation is a video gaming brand owned and produced by Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE), a division of Japanese conglomerate Sony. Its flagship products consists of a series of home video game consoles produced under the brand; it also consists ...

, the game was officially known as the PlayStation Fiesta Bowl.

Teams

As one of the

New Year's Six The New Year's Six, sometimes abbreviated as NY6, are the following NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) bowl games: the Rose Bowl, Sugar Bowl, Orange Bowl, Cotton Bowl, Peach Bowl, and Fiesta Bowl. These games are traditionally play ...

bowl games, the participants of the game were determined by the College Football Playoff Selection Committee. This was the first time that Notre Dame and Oklahoma State had ever played each other.

Notre Dame Fighting Irish

Notre Dame finished their regular season with an 11–1 overall record, losing only to

Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ; colloquially nicknamed Cincy) is a city in Hamilton County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. Settled in 1788, the city is located on the northern side of the confluence of the Licking River (Kentucky), Licking and Ohio Ri ...

in early October. The Fighting Irish defeated one ranked team,

Wisconsin Wisconsin ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest of the United States. It borders Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michig ...

, and entered the Fiesta Bowl ranked fifth in all major polls. After beating Stanford in the last game of the regular season, Brian Kelly left to take the job at LSU and Defensive Coordinator Marcus Freeman was promoted to head coach shortly less than a week later

Oklahoma State Cowboys

Led by head coach

Mike Gundy Michael Ray Gundy (born August 12, 1967) is an American college football coach and former player. He is the head football coach at Oklahoma State University. Gundy played college football at Oklahoma State, where he played quarterback from 1986 t ...

in his 17th season, Oklahoma State entered the season with a narrow defeat of FCS-ranked Missouri State. They followed up with another narrow comeback win against

Tulsa Tulsa ( ) is the second-most-populous city in the state of Oklahoma, after Oklahoma City, and the 48th-most-populous city in the United States. The population was 413,066 as of the 2020 census. It is the principal municipality of the Tul ...

after scoring three touchdowns in the fourth quarter alone, and then took to the road for their first away game against

Boise State Boise State University (BSU) is a public research university in Boise, Idaho, United States. Founded in 1932 by the Episcopal Church, it became an independent junior college in 1934 and has been awarding baccalaureate and master's degrees It ...

, which resulted in a one-point win for the Cowboys. They faced their first conference opponent the following week, No. 25

Kansas State Kansas State University (KSU, Kansas State, or K-State) is a public land-grant research university with its main campus in Manhattan, Kansas, United States. It was opened as the state's land-grant college in 1863 and was the first public inst ...

, and the Cowboys pulled the upset to move to 4–0 and jump into the

rankings A ranking is a relationship between a set of items, often recorded in a list, such that, for any two items, the first is either "ranked higher than", "ranked lower than", or "ranked equal to" the second. In mathematics, this is known as a weak ...

at No. 19. Oklahoma State then faced No. 21 Baylor, whom they defeated by ten points, which led into a

bye week In sport, a bye is the preferential status of a player or team that is automatically advanced to the next round of a tournament without having to play an opponent in an early round. In knockout (elimination) tournaments, byes may be assigned ei ...

. The Cowboys then traveled to No. 25

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

, overcoming an early deficit to win by eight and vault themselves into the top ten, at No. 8. Another road game saw Oklahoma State drop their first game of the year, as they lost to

Iowa State Iowa State University of Science and Technology (Iowa State University, Iowa State, or ISU) is a public land-grant research university in Ames, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1858 as the Iowa Agricultural College and Model Farm, Iowa State be ...

by three points. The Cowboys rebounded with a dominant win over

Kansas Kansas ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Nebraska to the north; Missouri to the east; Oklahoma to the south; and Colorado to the west. Kansas is named a ...

, and held

West Virginia West Virginia is a mountainous U.S. state, state in the Southern United States, Southern and Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States.The United States Census Bureau, Census Bureau and the Association of American ...

to a field goal the following week in a three-touchdown win. They continued on their win streak with another dominant win, this time over

TCU TCU may stand for: Education * Tanzania Commission for Universities, regulatory body for Universities in Tanzania * Texas Christian University, a private university in Fort Worth, Texas ** TCU Horned Frogs, the athletic programs of the school * Tok ...

, and followed with a shutout win in their final away game of the season against

Texas Tech Texas Tech University (Texas Tech, Tech, or TTU) is a public research university in Lubbock, Texas, United States. Established on February 10, 1923, and called Texas Technological College until 1969, it is the flagship institution of the five- ...

; this victory clinched them a spot in the championship game. The Cowboys ended their regular season with an 8–1 record in Big 12 games, finishing with a four-point home win against No. 10

Oklahoma Oklahoma ( ; Choctaw language, Choctaw: , ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Texas to the south and west, Kansas to the north, Missouri to the northea ...

, their first win in the rivalry series since an overtime victory in

2014 The year 2014 was marked by the surge of the Western African Ebola epidemic, West African Ebola epidemic, which began in 2013, becoming the List of Ebola outbreaks, most widespread outbreak of the Ebola, Ebola virus in human history, resul ...

. In the

Big 12 Championship Game The Big 12 Championship Game is a college football game held by the Big 12 Conference between the best and the second-best Big 12 team. The game was played each year since the conference's formation in 1996 until 2010 and returned during the 201 ...

, Oklahoma State lost a rematch against Baylor, 21–16. Oklahoma State entered the Fiesta Bowl with an overall 11–2 record.

Game summary

Statistics

References

External links

Game statistics
at statbroadcast.com {{Oklahoma State Cowboys bowl game navbox

Fiesta Bowl Notre Dame Fighting Irish football bowl games Oklahoma State Cowboys football bowl games