By Edward Lewis, Sports Editor
San Diego State is bowl eligible.
Finally.
SDSU had won a combined 13 games in four seasons between 2006 and 2009. It hadn’t sniffed a bowl game since 1998. And before head coach Brady Hoke got here, there were rumblings the school might shut down the football program.
But the Aztecs beat Wyoming 48-38 on Saturday in Laramie, Wyo., improved their record to 6-2 and became bowl eligible before the calendar turned to November.
“Six wins is awesome,” junior quarterback Ryan Lindley told The Mtn. after the game. “We’re glad to get there. But our mindset is still on the championship.”
The Lindley, DeMarco Sampson and Vincent Brown show continued to roll, running back Brandon Sullivan scored three touchdowns and the SDSU defense held off the elusive Austyn Carta-Samuels long enough to snag its best record to start a season since 1977 at War Memorial Stadium.
Lindley completed just 16 of his 32 pass attempts, but he made them count. He threw for 365 yards and three touchdowns, averaging 22.8 yards per completion. On the receiving end, Sampson and Brown combined to catch 12 passes for 319 yards and two touchdowns. It was Sampson, though, who carried the load for the Aztecs in the fourth quarter.
SDSU had a 41-24 lead early in the fourth, but Wyoming rode sophomore quarterback Carta-Samuels and rallied off 14 unanswered points to make the game 41-38 with less than eight minutes remaining. It was a familiar sight for the Aztecs, who had blown a 27-6 fourth-quarter lead to the Cowboys last season.
But Sampson caught a 59-yard bomb from Lindley with 4:56 remaining on the clock and gave SDSU a 48-38 lead it wouldn’t relinquish. Sampson finished the game with seven catches for 175 yards and two scores.
“It was play action and they came down so the top was open,” Sampson told media about the touchdown catch after the game. “So Ryan (Lindley) just chucked it deep. I tracked it down and I just had to look it in.”
In the first half, the Aztecs had trouble getting out of their own way. They fumbled a punt return, threw an interception and had a Brian Stahovich punt blocked. Lindley even hurt his ankle and had to hit the locker room before the second quarter ended. But despite all that, they still led at halftime 20-17.
In the second half, things got better. SDSU only turned the ball over once, and forced a turnover of its own. The Aztecs’ special teams got better too, highlighted by a Stahovich school-record 89-yard punt. And if it weren’t for Carta-Samuels, who finished the game 20-for-40 with a combined 237 rushing and passing yards and four total touchdowns, SDSU would have been celebrating its sixth win a lot sooner.
“We’re 2-0 in the second half of the season,” Hoke said to reporters after the game. “That’s how we’ve looked at it since the first six games were over with. It’s just a way for us to make sure that we’re taking care of the things, the details that we have to take care of.”
The win gives the Aztecs their first three-game winning streak since 2002. It also marks Hoke’s 10th career win as SDSU head coach.
The Aztecs are still in third place in the Mountain West Conference standings, but can take home the MWC crown if they win their final four games.
