OBNUG Hall of Fame: Ian Johnson inducted

 

Congratulations to Ian Johnson and his Oregon State TD extravaganza for gaining induction into the OBNUG Hall of Fame. His performance earned 91 percent of the vote, which was well over the 70 percent needed to get in. Thanks again to Drew from Fight Fight BSU for stating his case so eloquently.

Johnson's induction signals the end of the first year of the OBNUG Hall of Fame. Thank you to all who contributed nominees, wrote stories, and voted in the polls. We're looking forward to doing this again next year, so keep in mind any candidates you feel deserve to be in the HOF and feel free to let us know.

Here is the inaugural class of the OBNUG Hall of Fame:

• Marty Tadman's Fiesta Bowl
• Ryan Dinwiddie's three quarters versus Fresno State
• The 1980 Division I-AA championship game
• The day Boise State moved up to Division 1-A
• The three plays to win the Fiesta Bowl: hook-and-ladder, Perretta TD toss, and Statue of Liberty
• Ian Johnson's Oregon State romp

The shrine in our master bedroom's armoire does not do these moments justice.

HOF nominee: Ian Johnson's Oregon State romp

Once again, we are privileged to feature the written-word stylings of Drew from Fight Fight BSU. A Boise State diehard and an occasional mascot interviewer, Drew has the honor of introducing the final nominee in the inaugural OBNUG Hall of Fame class: Ian Johnson's five-TD game against Oregon State.



We were sitting in the stands at Bronco Stadium on the night of September 7, 2006, and some rowdy Oregon State fans nearby were reveling in the Beavers’ fast start. Oregon State’s Sammie Stroughter had just returned a Boise State punt for a touchdown to put the Beavers up 14-0 in the first quarter, and a cocky OSU fan stood up and announced, “All day, baby. All day." The mood in Bronco Stadium echoed the lackluster play of the Broncos to that point.

Then something happened. My wife and I weren’t really even paying close attention as the Broncos hadn’t given us much to cheer about as of yet, but a loud cheer was starting to emanate from the crowd. I looked up to see the sophomore running back that everyone had been high on in spring ball slashing past two Beaver linebackers and outsprinting Oregon State’s secondary for a 60-yard touchdown. The crowd was on their feet and life seemed to be coming back to the sluggish-looking Broncos.

“Who was that?” my wife asked.

“Ian Johnson," I replied. "He’s supposed to be a good one."

Not even I knew how good Johnson would be on that September night...or how good he would be that whole year. Nobody knew, at that moment in the first quarter when the Broncos made it a one touchdown game, that Ian Johnson was going to be something special, perhaps even the greatest Bronco running back of all time. But by the end of regulation, we knew.Johnson came into his own that night, patiently following blocks, keeping his feet churning for extra yardage, showing explosive acceleration and determination. He was the feature back that everyone had been waiting for, and he didn’t just upstage the Beavers that night--he embarrassed them on national television.

Johnson rushed for 240 yards on 22 carries and scored five touchdowns against the Pac-10’s Oregon State. 240 yards on 22 carries?! Yeah, that is almost 11 yards per carry--11 yards per carry against an Oregon State team that defeated USC that same season.

None of Ian’s touchdowns more exemplified just how good he was that night than his third TD. Ian got the ball at about the four or five yard line and was hit at about the two. He was pushed back about a yard before surging forward again as Oregon State defenders piled on, trying in vain to stop him as he eventually carried the whole stack of ‘em into the endzone.

Around the time Ian scored his fifth TD, putting Boise State up 42-14, the Oregon State fans sitting nearby started to quietly head for the exits. I don’t know what came over me, but I stood up and shouted after them “All day, baby. All day.”

Ian has had some impressive and heroic games since that night. Certainly he is en route to be the greatest Bronco running back ever, but on September 7, 2006, Ian was simply amazing.

Voting for Ian Johnson's Oregon State romp will take place through next week. Use the poll in the sidebar to cast your vote.

OBNUG Hall of Fame: automatic inductees

Congratulations to the honorary inductees of the first OBNUG Hall of Fame class.

• The 1980 Division I-AA national championship: historical, unprecedented, neat.
• The day Boise State joined Division I-A: important, momentous, huge.
• Fiesta Bowl hook-and-ladder: unexpected, exhilarating, life-altering.
• Fiesta Bowl Perretta TD pass: gutsy, unconventional, brilliant.
• Fiesta Bowl Statue of Liberty: outstanding, sneaky, perfect.

Voting was close for the automatic entries: 52 percent "yes" to 47 percent "absolutely yes." Thank you to the hundreds who voted even though there was little to vote for. We'll have another nominee next week.

OBNUG Hall of Fame: honorary inductees

Throughout the history of the Boise State football program, there have been several defining moments that will forever be a part of BSU lore. And by several, we are thinking of three.

The following moments have earned themselves honorary induction into the OBNUG Hall of Fame thanks to their monumental importance in shaping the Boise State football program. We’ll be skipping out on a podcast this week, but please feel free to vote in the poll at the sidebar.

Here are the honorary candidates for the OBNUG Hall of Fame:

1. The 1980 Division I-AA national championship
   Over the past five years, revisionists have called a number of different games the “biggest game in Boise State history.” There was the Fort Worth Bowl, the Liberty Bowl, the Fiesta Bowl, and there were even regular season matchups against Nevada and Fresno State that earned the distinction. Hello! Boise State played in a national championship game! It doesn’t get any bigger than that!
   The future of Boise State football is indeed bright, but the past had its moments, too. The 1980 national championship is more than deserving of a spot in the OBNUG Hall of Fame, and it is deserving of more credit than it receives, too. Tons of teams spend their entire existence trying to win a championship, and Boise State has already accomplished the feat. If you include the junior college title in 1958, they’ve accomplished the feat twice.
   Fan appreciation can be fleeting, but the 1980 national championship game can rest assured that the OBNUG Hall of Fame is forever (until our server gives out).
   
2. The day Boise State joined Division I-A
   If you looked back to a single moment that changed the fortunes of the BSU football program more than anything, it would probably be the jump to Division I-A. Ever since 1996, when Boise State left the Big Sky and joined the big boys in the Big West (“big boys” being a relative term), things have been different around here.
   The move was the start of the groundswell of Bronco Nation. The move led the way for Boise State to improve facilities, budgets, and competition. National success and the scorn of Trev Alberts would have never been achieved had the Broncos remained stagnant in Division I-AA, and any future success can be attributed to the way the team and the school has transitioned to a spot alongside the best teams in the country.
   
3. The Fiesta Bowl
   What more can we say about the Fiesta Bowl? To be sure, it is a game that no Bronco fan will ever forget, but even more so, it is a game that no casual football fan will ever forget. We can’t remember any of Toledo’s greatest games, but Toledo fans certainly remember the Fiesta Bowl.
   The staying power of the Fiesta lies in the three plays that Boise State needed to win the game. The hook and ladder, Perretta to Schouman, and the Statue of Liberty will forever be part of college football history, so we are inducting each into the OBNUG Hall of Fame. The Broncos would have never got to overtime without Jerard Rabb’s hook and ladder touchdown. They would have never recovered from Oklahoma’s overtime touchdown without Perretta’s fourth-down TD toss. Ian Johnson would have never proposed had it not been for Statue Left. And who knows what Chris Myers would have done after the game.

OBNUG Hall of Fame: Dinwiddie inducted

Congratulations to Ryan Dinwiddie on his induction into the OBNUG Hall of Fame. Dinwiddie's three quarters of fire and brimstone on the Fresno State secondary was never in doubt of induction, ending up with over 90 percent of the vote. Special thanks to David Carr for providing the nine percent of no votes.

Dinwiddie joins Marty Tadman's Fiesta Bowl as the second inductee into the Hall of Fame. Next week, we will have the third candidate for induction, so stay tuned.

OBNUG Hall of Fame podcast #2

We are trotting out the big A/V guns again for our Hall of Fame nominees. Our second ever OBNUG podcast should sound much better than the first. There was nowhere to go but up, right?

Once again, Nick and I debate the merits of this week's Hall candidate--Ryan Dinwiddie's three quarters versus Fresno State. We also find time to discuss recruiting, Taylor Tharp, and drunken Nevada Wolfpack players.

Voting for Dinwiddie will be available through Sunday, so vote, vote, vote! (Actually, just vote once; we don't want a repeat of last time.)

HOF Discussion: Dinwiddie's 3 quarters vs. Fresno Hide Player | Play in Popup | Download

HOF nominee: Dinwiddie's 3 quarters vs. Fresno

This week's OBNUG Hall of Fame nominee is brought to you courtesty of Bronco fan Jason Haberman. Visit his blog at www.jasonhaberman.com. Praise his diction and vocabulary. And join him in recognizing one of the best performances in Boise State history.



When I was asked to contribute a nomination to the prestigious OBNUG Hall of Fame I was torn. Having been a Bronco fan since birth, I wondered, who should I choose. What performance did I think was worthy of being nominated?

Maybe I should recognize all the destruction that LB/DE Eric Helgeson leveled on the Big Sky in the late 80s. Do I go back to that magical '94 run where QB Tony Hilde and RB KC Adams and company ended "The Streak" and made it all the way to the national championship game? What about QB Bart Hendricks and his 77-yard scamper in that Humanitarian Bowl versus UTEP? I was very close to choosing LB Korey Hall versus Oregon State in 2004 with the volleyball interception (one of his three that game) and subsequent bull charge down the sideline for the score.

However, there is but one performance that I witnessed that was so amazing that there was no way I could ignore it: Ryan Dinwiddie versus Fresno State, October 18, 2002.

Let me set the scene. Dinwiddie was our prolific passing leader coming back for his junior season after lighting up scoreboards and record books the previous year. Hopes were high. We opened the season with the usual drubbing of Idaho, which set the stage for Boise State's big trip to SEC country to face the Arkansas Razorbacks.

Well, that game didn't quite turn out as well as we would have liked. In fact, it was a disaster. Dinwiddie was sacked early in the game and broke his ankle in the process. The day just got worse from there, and we lost 41-14.

But worse than losing the game was losing our all-everything gunslinger. In came untested senior B.J. Rhode. Talk was, if we could get a split of the four games that Dinwiddie was going to miss, then we could still be in contention for the WAC title.

Rhode did more than split. He excelled. He took the reigns, and in those four games the BSU offense put up point totals of 35, 63, 58 and 52 in four consecutive blowouts. This got the locals talking: "Should Dinwiddie be the starter when he comes back?" "B.J. has earned the right to keep playing." So on and so forth.

We had Fresno in our building for a Friday night ESPN showdown for what could decide the WAC championship. The fans were pumped. This warm evening was the first game that the entire record crowd was completely decked out in orange, all 30,924 of us. Something special was about to happen. You could feel it.

Rhode started the game, but we all knew Dinwiddie would play. The real question was, how much, and would he be rusty?

Rhode engineered a 13-point cushion playing the entire first quarter. But Dinwiddie jogged out in the second quarter and answered every doubter. He simply put on a clinic. He was absolutely on fire. His final stat line says it all: 19 for 22, 406 yards and 5 touchdowns. In less than three quarters! Boise State set a school record for yardage with 688 yards that day; Brock Forsey pitched in 132 yards of his own. Dinwiddie averaged over 21 yards per completion. One in every 3.8 pass attempts ended with a touchdown. That is domination.

I haven't even gotten into his innumerable Boise State records or his setting the NCAA career passer efficiency rating record.

Dinwiddie owned Fresno that day. And in my mind, his performance is worthy to be a sure-fire OBNUG Hall of Fame inductee.

OBNUG Hall of Fame: Tadman inducted!

Congratulations to Marty Tadman on the induction of his Fiesta Bowl performance into the OBNUG Hall of Fame. On a similar note, thanks for nothing, whoever messed with our poll the first time.

The first inductee in the 2008 Hall of Fame class certainly had to earn his way in. After a narrow loss on his first nomination, some tears from the OBNUG staff, rumors of conspiracy, and a re-vote, Tadman's Fiesta Bowl made the cut, garnering 87% of the vote.

Tomorrow we'll have the next candidate for induction. Thanks to everyone who voted, and double thanks for voting "yes."

Re-vote! The fix was in for Marty Tadman

Conspiracy theorists are buzzing...at least those conspiracy theorists who care about Boise State blogs.

Was Marty Tadman's Hall of Fame vote tampered with? Did a rogue Tadman-hater stuff the ballot box? Did we horribly underestimate Vandal alumni?

When we checked the results on Monday, we were surprised to see that Tadman's Fiesta Bowl performance had been denied induction. We figured that our love for Tadman had blinded us to the fact that his Fiesta Bowl was not as awesome as we thought. Apparently, we figured wrong.

Alert reader J Harry notified us of some shady dealings during voting. We'll let J Harry explain:

When I looked at the percentages, his approval for induction was well over 70%. As I was on, frequently refreshing the page, I literally saw his score drop, one percent at a time. I feel strongly that one person was probably voting repeatedly to get the total under 70%... otherwise it would have been well above the cut-off.

Great work, J Harry! You may have just earned yourself a Hall of Fame nomination in a few years. Apparently, someone wanted Tadman out, and they were willing to refresh our homepage often enough to see it done.

We feel that it is only fair to do a re-vote for Tadman. The poll will be back up later today, and we'll hold the voting through Monday morning. To make sure that our readers really do want Tadman in the OBNUG Hall of Fame, we are requiring 80 percent of the vote for his induction.

Thanks for reading, and thanks for voting (once).

HOF: Tadman's Fiesta Bowl falls short

The people have spoken, and they do not feel the same way we do about Marty Tadman.

Tadman's Fiesta Bowl performance was the first nominee for the OBNUG Hall of Fame, a shoo-in as far as we were concerned, but he failed to earn the required 70 percent of the vote for induction, falling two percent short at 68 percent.

Were it up to us, Tadman would have been a sure-fire inductee, and he probably would have the Hall of Fame named after him. However, we value the opinion of our readers, and we appreciate you guys letting us know what you think. The OBNUG Hall of Fame will, apparently, be the toughest ticket in town.

Thanks to the hundreds who voted. We'll have the second OBNUG Hall of Fame nominee for you next week.

OBNUG Hall of Fame podcast

We are taking this Hall of Fame business pretty seriously. How seriously? Podcast serious!

Behold the first ever OBNUG podcast! Nick and I sat down to dish on Marty Tadman, Fiesta Bowl rankings, and listening to Idaho Sports Talk in hell. We presented the case for the induction of Tadman's Fiesta Bowl performance (click here for more), and then we got bored and talked about other stuff.

Technically, it is not the greatest sounding podcast. I sound like I'm in a wind tunnel, Nick sounds like he's yelling, and the letter "p" might burst your eardrum. Give us time; we'll get it right.

Enjoy and don't forget to vote for Tadman's Fiesta Bowl performance!

HOF Discussion: Marty Tadman's Fiesta Bowl Hide Player | Play in Popup | Download

HOF nominee: Marty Tadman's Fiesta Bowl

To vote for Marty Tadman's Fiesta Bowl, use the poll on the sidebar. Voting will take place through the weekend, and nominees need 70 percent of the vote to gain induction.

Was the OBNUG Hall of Fame built with Marty Tadman in mind? Quite definitely, yes.

Anyone who spends five minutes with us knows that we are enthralled with Tadman up to and over the point of obsession. We feel that he was one of the greatest Boise State players of all-time, and he is a close, personal friend (in the alternate reality in which we live). Tadman's heroics over the course of his career speak monuments to his ability, leadership, and smarts, and picking just one Tadman moment for our first OBNUG Hall of Fame class was difficult.

But not impossible.

The Fiesta Bowl was one of the greatest moments in Boise State history, and it was fitting that one of Boise State's greatest players had one of his biggest games. Tadman showed up when it counted most, and without him, our collection of Fiesta Bowl t-shirts would be much less cool.

His solid, all-around play served merely as context for his two spectacular, timely, heads-up interceptions. The first stopped a drive; the second gave the Broncos breathing room (Jared Zabransky, obviously, hates breathing room).

After the Broncos jumped out to a 14-0 lead, Oklahoma started its comeback. The Sooners cut the lead in half, and on their next drive, they looked poised to strike again. Tadman, however, had other ideas. He picked off Oklahoma QB Paul Thompson in the end zone to kill the drive.

Later, with the Broncos holding on to a 21-10 lead midway through the third quarter, Tadman struck again. A Thompson pass headed for the flat was tipped by Korey Hall and picked by Tadman, who ran untouched into the end zone. The pick-six gave Boise State its biggest lead of the game, and it put the Broncos in great position to win.

Tadman's Fiesta Bowl picks were things of beauty, and his overall play spearheaded an aggressive, unheralded defense. The beauty of Boise State's victory was not in the trick plays or gimmicky offense. The real value was that the Broncos belonged on the same field as a Big XII team in every facet of the game.

We have Marty Tadman to thank for that.

Welcome to the OBNUG Hall of Fame

There are many ways to memorialize our favorite Boise State Bronco football players. Bedroom shrines, lower back tattoos, and naming children come immediately to mind. Yet we at OBNUG feel that the special performances in Boise State history deserve a special place, and until the city of Boise turns the capitol building into Bronco Mecca, that place is going to be here on the Internets of OBNUG.

We are proud to announce the official beginning of the OBNUG Hall of Fame. Each summer we will look forward to enshrining deserving candidates who have had a hand in the success of Boise State football. In true OBNUG fashion, we will do so with humor, perspective, and horrible bias, and our Hall of Fame will be unlike any other you have seen.

Most hall of fames reward careers and longevity. Not us. We want to enshrine nominees under the following criteria:

1. A singular moment, performance, or action
2. A significant impact on the history of Boise State football

Those two rules are the main laws of OBNUG's Hall of Fame. So for instance, instead of nominating Brock Forsey for his stellar career, we would instead nominate a particular performance against Fresno State. We are seeking fantastic individual performances or plays that made an impact on the team we love. Also, we are always up for nominees that rhyme with "Binfiddie."

Best of all, we want you, our loyal reader, to take part. For each nominee, we will allow a voting process to determine whether or not the candidate gets inducted. Seventy-percent or higher and they're in. Also, we value feedback and opinions on each of the candidates and on nominees you would like to see entered.

Hopefully, this will help make the summer go faster. And hopefully, Marty Tadman gets inducted multiple times.