2005 Fiesta Bowl

Pittsburgh started 2004 with two victories in their first four games, which included a narrow overtime win over Division I-AA ranked Furman.

The Panthers won five of their next six games, which included a victory over #24 ranked Notre Dame before defeating rival and #21 West Virginia to finish in a three-way tie for the Big East Conference regular season championship with Boston College and West Virginia, who both had been defeated by the Panthers.

Paris Warren was Smith's go-to man during the game, as he caught a Fiesta Bowl record 15 passes for 198 yards and 2 touchdowns.

[9] Utah was the first of five programs from a non-AQ conference to reach a BCS bowl game until its discontinuation on the closure of the 2013 NCAA Division I FBS football season.

Kyle Wittingham would keep the ship steady in his tenure with the program, which started with winning bowl games in each of his first five seasons.

In 2008, the Utes would run the table and win the Mountain West championship, which included victories over 11th-ranked TCU and 16th-ranked BYU to earn an invitation to compete in the 2009 Sugar Bowl as a non-qualifier conference selection once again, this time playing against 4th ranked Alabama.

They defeated them to become the first non-qualifier to win two BCS bowls, with one selector in Anderson & Hester going so far as to select Utah as the national champion.