Boise State to appear in third consecutive Mountain West football championship game

Computers select Boise State, UNLV to break four-way tie

Boise State's Matt Wagner. | Boise State Athletics

The computers wanted a trilogy. 

For the third consecutive season, Boise State and UNLV will meet in the Mountain West football championship game. Kickoff between the Broncos (8-4, 6-2) and Rebels (10-2, 6-2) is scheduled for 6 p.m. Mountain time on Friday at Albertsons Stadium. 

The Broncos won the previous two title game matchups, including a 21-7 home victory last season to clinch a College Football Playoff berth. 

To break a four-way tie between MWC regular-season co-champions Boise State, New Mexico (9-3, 6-2), San Diego State (9-3, 6-2) and UNLV, the MWC used a computer rankings average between four metrics: Connelly SP+, SportSource, ESPN’s SOR and KPI Rankings.

Boise State and UNLV came out on top in the four metrics. The Broncos were selected as the MWC championship game host due to a 56-31 victory over the Rebels in October. 

Sitting at 6-4 overall and 4-2 in MWC play after suffering back-to-back losses to Fresno State (8-4, 5-3) and San Diego State, Boise State’s three-peat hopes appeared to be over. 

But the Broncos rallied behind backup quarterback Max Cutforth and ripped off consecutive wins over Colorado State (2-10, 1-7) and Utah State (6-6, 4-4) to close the regular season. The strong finish was enough to put Boise State above New Mexico and San Diego State in the computer rankings.

“We handled our business, and I’m proud of our guys,” Broncos head coach Spencer Danielson said after a come-from-behind 25-24 victory at Utah State. “We went into this and I didn’t talk about other teams and what needed to happen. We needed to go out and handle business, and we did that, and we’re going to let the chips fall where they may.

“I look at our team, and yes, we had two tough losses in conference because we didn’t respond well to our quarterback being out and we didn’t play our best as a team, and that’s on me. Those are two games we’ve had to learn a lot from, and then (the other) two losses have been on the road against two really good football teams. So we’re going to let the chips fall where they may. I believe in this team, I believe they should absolutely deserve the right to go play in the championship game with how we finished the season, and I’m excited to see that happen.” 

The Broncos have made it to eight of the last nine MWC championship games as they prepare to leave for the Pac-12 next summer alongside Colorado State, Fresno State, San Diego State and Utah State. 

UNLV will return to Albertsons Stadium on a four-game winning streak, including a 42-17 road thrashing of Nevada (3-9, 2-6) on Saturday.