{"id":84176,"date":"2025-12-22T20:15:15","date_gmt":"2025-12-23T01:15:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/?p=84176"},"modified":"2025-12-22T20:15:15","modified_gmt":"2025-12-23T01:15:15","slug":"cougars-deep-fry-the-aggies-in-potato-bowl-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/2025\/12\/22\/cougars-deep-fry-the-aggies-in-potato-bowl-win\/","title":{"rendered":"Cougars Deep Fry The Aggies In Potato Bowl Win"},"content":{"rendered":"
It’s not too often that the fan bases of bowl participants find the travel both equal distance and manageable. Both Washington State and Utah State fan bases helped bring some extra crispiness to the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl. The announced attendance of over 18,000 is the most the bowl game has seen since 2018. However, one set of fans received an order of undercooked potatoes due to their team’s performance. Washington State showed up with the hot oil and got their Potal Bowl win golden brown by the score of 34-21.<\/div>\n

Cougars Deep Fry The Aggies In Potato Bowl Win<\/h2>\n

A One-Sided Mashing For Most Of The Game<\/h3>\n
Washington State had not been an explosive offense this season. But they have been highly competitive against multiple playoff teams. With all the instability around this program and a new head coach taking over for a second consecutive season, Last Word didn’t expect much from the Cougars, who weren’t expected to show up and execute at a high level<\/a>. However, a couple of Cougars had their best showings of the 2025 season in their Potato Bowl win. Quarterback Zevi Eckhaus<\/a> finished the game with a season high in pass attempts (44) and completions (26) for 334 yards to go with his single-game high three touchdowns. Meanwhile, running back Maxwell Woods<\/a> came into this game having rushed for 108 yards all season. He would finish the game with 117 yards on just nine carries. While the offense was operating very buttery, the defense also came to play.<\/div>\n
Bronco Mendenhall’s team has had a live-by\/die-by the deep ball all season. However, the front four of Washington State made that impossible most of the day. In fact, the Cougars’ front four smothered the Aggies’ offense in ways that would make Waffle House’s hash browns jealous. With 3:47 left in the third quarter, Washington State had outgained Utah State 413-56.<\/div>\n

Pan-Cooked Aggies Flipped With An Interception<\/h3>\n
But as one-sided as the yards were, the game was still in grasp. Eckhaus threw two interceptions in the first quarter. The Cougars also missed a field goal on their opening drive of the game. However, the 20-0 lead felt insurmountable until late in the third quarter. Eckhaus made his worst throw of the day for his third interception. On the next play, Utah State finally connected on a deep pass for 43 yards. The Aggies would punch it in for a touchdown four plays later. Suddenly, they were right back in the thick of the fry bath, only down 13 with a full quarter to play.<\/div>\n
However, Washington State smashed in late comeback hopes on the very next drive. The offense kept grilling the Aggies’ defense and scored a touchdown, pushing the lead back up to 27-7. For a game that only saw 27 points combined for the first three quarters, both defenses were gassed for the rest of the game. Until Washington State knelt out the final minute of the game, both teams traded touchdowns to combine for 28 points in the fourth quarter. Washington State would finish the game with 628 yards of offense. As Seinfeld would say, “That’s a lot of potatoes.<\/a>“<\/div>\n

Potato Bowl Win Is Well-Seasoned For Cougar Fans<\/h3>\n
Even after Utah State pulled within 13, the Potato Bowl win for Washington State never seemed in doubt. Utah State now has a 1-5 record in the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl. \u00a0The bowl victory is the first for Washington State since 2018. With the newly hired head coach Kirby Moore watching from the press box, the Cougars made a great first impression on the new coach. Moore will look to keep the momentum building for this team as it embarks on yet another change to its conference affiliation in 2026.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Main Photo: Photo Credit: Robert Hubner WSU Photo Services<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s not too often that the fan bases of bowl participants find the travel both equal distance and manageable. Both Washington State and Utah State fan bases helped bring some extra crispiness to the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl. The announced attendance of over 18,000 is the most the bowl game has seen since 2018. However, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3959,"featured_media":84195,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"1","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7361,2,13,17,4],"tags":[1961,10187],"class_list":["post-84176","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bowl-games","category-featured","category-mountainwest","category-news","category-pac12","tag-bronco-mendenhall","tag-kirby-moore"],"modified_by":"Kate Pearson Halyburton, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84176","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3959"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=84176"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84176\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":84197,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84176\/revisions\/84197"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/84195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84176"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84176"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84176"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}