BYU football: Cougar bowl games, then and now

Top 10 most memorable BYU bowl games

PROVO — When BYU squares off against Tulsa in the Dec. 30 Armed Forces Bowl in Dallas, it will mark the Cougars' 30th all-time trip to a bowl game.

Last spring, prior to BYU's inaugural season as an independent, the school entered into an agreement to participate in the Armed Forces Bowl if bowl eligible and not selected for a BCS game.

The Cougars have similar agreements with the Poinsettia Bowl in 2012 in San Diego and the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl in 2013 in San Francisco.

The Armed Forces Bowl is the 14th different bowl game BYU has played in since its first one, the Fiesta Bowl, in 1974.

The Cougars boast a colorful bowl history, featuring a bevy of memorable victories and forgettable losses. BYU owns a lackluster 11-17-1 record in bowl games, but it has won four of its last five.

Here's an in-depth look at the Cougars' bowl past.

HEAPS 'O FUN … BUT NOT FOR LONG (2010)

In BYU's most recent bowl game, last December, the Cougars kicked off the college football bowl season with a dominating 52-24 triumph over former Western Athletic Conference rival UTEP in the 2010 New Mexico Bowl.

It marked BYU's fourth bowl win in five years and secured coach Bronco Mendenhall's fifth consecutive winning season.

The Cougars were led by true freshman quarterback Jake Heaps, who earned New Mexico Bowl offensive MVP honors by completing 25-of-34 passes for 264 yards and four touchdowns, and shattering Ty Detmer's freshman record for most TD passes. Heaps, who revealed after the game that he was playing with a fractured rib suffered against Utah, also set the BYU record for best completion percentage (.735) in a bowl game.

At that point, it appeared that Heaps was on the cusp of becoming the Cougars' next great quarterback.

"I think he has a very bright future," Mendenhall said after the game. "He continues to learn how to lead our team, he continues to learn what it means to be the quarterback at BYU. Now he knows what it feels like to win a bowl game at the college level. That's something a lot of first-year quarterbacks don't have the opportunity to do."

UTEP coach Mike Price, the former Weber State coach, was also impressed with Heaps. "I like him a whole lot. He didn't play like a freshman, he played like a veteran. He commanded the offense really well."