Inside Boise State's trick plays and proposal 20 years later

Ian Johnson was flying home from Disney World with his wife and three daughters last month when the gate agent stopped him.

As he scanned Johnson's boarding pass, the agent immediately recognized the name.

"Hey, I know you," he told Johnson, a former Boise State running back. "I know exactly where I was."

Johnson knew exactly what he meant.

"We're just sitting there holding up the line," Johnson said. "Talking about this old play."

Twenty years later, the upset, the trick plays, the proposal -- all remain unforgettable.

On Jan. 1, 2007, unbeaten Boise State arrived at the Fiesta Bowl as a heavy underdog against Oklahoma, the Big 12 champion.

The Broncos jumped on the Sooners early, building an 18-point lead in the third quarter. But Oklahoma rallied and, with just over a minute remaining, returned a Jared Zabransky interception for a touchdown to take its first lead of the game.

What followed became one of the most improbable finishes in college football history.

Boise State used three trick plays in the final minute and overtime to win 43-42: a hook-and-ladder on fourth-and-18 to force overtime; a fourth-down halfback pass for a touchdown on fourth down; and the Statue of Liberty for the game-winning 2-point conversion.

"It's the ultimate underdog story," said former Boise State coach Chris Petersen, who will be inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in December.

The ultimate love story, too.

With the celebration still unfolding on the field, Johnson got down on one knee and proposed to his girlfriend, Boise State cheerleader Chrissy Popadics.

"My most iconic football moment has nothing to do with football," Johnson said. "The biggest thing I ever did in a football jersey was propose to my wife."

This Saturday, Boise State travels to Western Michigan (3:30 p.m. ET, ESPN2) in a matchup that could have major implications for the Group of 6 College Football Playoff bid.

No Group of 6 team, including Boise State, has won a playoff game yet. But that Fiesta Bowl remains a reminder to smaller programs of what's possible.

"I remember where I was, hanging on the edge of my seat, hoping that they could pull it off," Western Michigan coach Lance Taylor said.

Next weekend at home against Utah State, Boise will honor the 2006 team on the field, commemorating the 20th anniversary of its undefeated season and Fiesta Bowl victory.

"I truly believed then that that was going to go down as one of the best college games of all time," Zabransky said. "Twenty years, I think that's still ringing true, which is pretty special."

The Broncos referred to their trick plays at the time as "specials." And the three that helped deliver one of college football's most memorable upsets each has a backstory of its own.

CIRCUS: 'That's the best we got?'

In 2004, the Broncos were on the verge of their first undefeated season and top-10 finish in program history.

But in the final seconds of the Liberty Bowl, Louisville intercepted Zabransky's pass in the end zone.

Zabransky threw four picks and lost a fumble in the opener against Georgia the following season. And Boise State's next bowl appearance ended the same way as the previous one: with a Zabransky interception in a 27-21 loss to Boston College.

"It was a struggle to recover from that for him," Petersen said. "That took so much confidence away from him."

The summer going into his final year, Zabransky met repeatedly with a neurolinguistics programming specialist to help him rebuild his confidence and overcome mistakes.

"That was a big step for me," he said, "overcoming a junior year that was not up to my standards."

As a senior, Zabransky rebounded to earn second-team All-WAC honors and led Boise State to an undefeated regular season.

In the first half of the Fiesta Bowl, Zabransky torched Oklahoma with two long touchdown throws to receiver Drisan James.

Midway through the third quarter, Boise State led the Sooners, 28-10.

"It might have been David and Goliath to the rest of the world," Zabransky said. "But we were beating them up at the line of scrimmage, our defense was turning them over and we were driving the length of the field and scoring. It wasn't like some mid-major team that got lucky."

But Oklahoma began to rally. And star running back Adrian Peterson, who had missed much of the year with a broken collarbone, started to find a groove.

The Sooners eventually tied the game, leaving Boise State with a little more than a minute for a potential game-winning drive.

Instead, Zabransky misread the coverage and threw an interception to Marcus Walker, who waltzed in untouched to put the Sooners ahead for the first time.

"You're just like, 'You got to be s---ting me,'" said former Boise offensive coordinator Bryan Harsin, watching the pick in disbelief from the box. "This guy has had a wonderful year. It can't end like this."

Zabransky's mother, Tana, couldn't bear to watch her son suffer another heartbreaking ending. She raced up the stadium stairs to the bathroom and began sobbing and praying.

Unlike previous bowl interceptions, Zabransky didn't hang his head. When the Broncos got the ball back, he scrambled and delivered a strike to tight end Derek Schouman to get the Broncos into OU territory.

But a sack and two incompletions left Boise State facing fourth-and-18 at midfield with 18 seconds to go.

The Broncos had a call left in their playbook for just the occasion. But they'd never used it in a game. And it never worked in practice.

They called it "Circus."

"I thought the name was fitting," Zabransky said.

Boise State ended every Friday practice with Circus.

The play called for the Broncos to keep pitching the ball after a completion in hopes someone would find a lane to the end zone.

Instead, the ball inevitably ended up on the ground.

"It was just a goof-off play," Johnson said.

But earlier that season, the Broncos added a wrinkle.

Instead of throwing the hook to the three-receiver side on the right, they flipped it.

"There was just a lot of traffic over there," Zabransky said. "Coach Pete was like, 'Why don't we run the hook to the single receiver?'"

Down to their last chance, Petersen called for Circus.

"The defensive guys, they're like, 'That's the best we got?'" Petersen recalled. "We were outside the Hail Mary line. So I'm thinking, 'Yeah, this is the best we got.'"

Zabransky found James, the single receiver on the left, who pitched the ball to Jerard Rabb sprinting across from the other side.

All five Sooners in the vicinity had to change direction. And none could catch Rabb, who wasn't known for his speed.

"I'm yelling 'pitch it' like an idiot," said Zabransky, who along with Johnson was trailing him. "But J-Rabb turned on the jets. That was the fastest any of us had ever seen him run."

Rabb's touchdown sent the game to overtime.

One of Zabransky's cousins rushed up the steps to find Tana and tell her the game wasn't over.

HALFBACK PASS: 'Are you sure?'

Vinny Perretta could always throw but rarely got to. His high school quarterback at La Costa Canyon in Carlsbad, California, was future Minnesota Vikings coach Kevin O'Connell. Perretta once threw a touchdown pass on a trick play against De La Salle, the No. 1 team in the country.

He hoped to follow O'Connell to San Diego State, but the offer never came.

"I remember watching Boise State play BYU with my dad," said Perretta, whose father, Ralph, played offensive line for six seasons in the NFL. "I'd never really heard of Boise State. But my dad was like, 'Vincent, this would be a fantastic offense for you.'"

Perretta took his father's advice and walked on at Boise State. After he was named scout team MVP as a freshman, the Broncos put him on scholarship.

"That's the way the program was run," he said. "We don't care if you're 6-foot-5 or 5-foot-8, come prove yourself and show you can be a good piece on this team. The best decision I ever made was coming to Boise State to play."

Perretta's versatility soon made him a valuable part of the offense.

"He played everywhere," Harsin said. "I loved the kid. You couldn't ask for a better player."

After Peterson scored for the Sooners on the first play of overtime -- stiff-arming a defender on the way -- Boise State faced fourth-and-2 from the Oklahoma 6-yard line.

The Broncos called timeout.

"When they called out the personnel group -- Chiefs Vinny -- it hit me: Wait, we only have one play out of this personnel group, and it's halfback pass," Perretta recalled. "And I was like, 'Oh my gosh, we're really running this.'"

Boise State had run a similar play out of the Wildcat formation earlier in the season against Wyoming. But that was a Perretta run. This was a pass.

"Chris is like, 'Are you sure?'" Harsin remembered Petersen asking him through the headset. "And no, I wasn't. I'm honestly s---ting my pants. But I didn't think we could run it at that point."

Instead, the Broncos banked that Oklahoma would recognize the formation from the Wyoming film and play the run.

"We also trusted Vinny as much as anyone on the team," Petersen said.

Zabransky motioned left, nearly crossing the line of scrimmage early. Perretta took the snap, rolled right and sold the run. As Schouman leaked through the defensive front, Perretta popped up and threw.

"And Vinny drops a freaking dime," Harsin said. "Just two of our best guys, Vinny and Derek, making a play in a critical moment."

Petersen had already decided he was going for the 2-point conversion and the win.

They were not giving Peterson another opportunity to touch the ball.

"We were all in agreement: 'That guy is going to destroy us,'" Harsin said. "He had just ripped through everybody. No one was gonna stop him."

The Broncos had one trick play left they'd been attempting to call all game. The moment had never been right.

Now, it was.

STATUE: 'Let's party!'

After a Week 4 win at Hawai'i in 2005, the Broncos had the night to themselves. Their flight back to Boise wasn't leaving until the following morning.

Johnson, Perretta and a few other players strolled around downtown Honolulu.

"So we're walking around, singing Rascal Flatts songs, goofing off," Johnson said. "We see a group of girls and we're like, 'Hey, you guys want to hang out with us?'"

They went to an arcade, then to the beach.

Johnson hung back talking to Chrissy Popadics -- unaware she was a Boise State cheerleader.

"I'm going to come off very dense for this, but never once did I ask why she was in Hawai'i," Johnson said. "We're like, we'll walk you all back to your hotel. Then once we get there, it's like, 'We're staying here, too -- wait, why are you staying here?'"

Though the two hit it off, Johnson didn't get her number.

"I'm kind of a nerd, I don't have immense skills," Johnson said. "I was just happy to be talking to this beautiful girl, who seemed to be on the same vibe."

Three weeks later, Johnson's roommate, linebacker David Shields, threw a party at their house. Johnson opened his bedroom door to see Popadics in the hallway.

"I'm like, 'Oh my goodness, I've been wanting to talk to you,'" Johnson recalled. "And she's like, 'I've been wanting to talk to you.'"

The next season, after they'd been dating for a year, Popadics drove to see the Broncos play at San Jose State.

In the first half, Johnson broke two ribs and suffered a punctured lung. He finished the game but later had to be rushed to the hospital.

Johnson said he passed out from the pain as doctors cut into the side of his chest using only topical anesthesia.

When he woke up in the hospital bed the next morning, Popadics was still there, sitting in a blue plastic chair by his side.

"I made the decision in that room with a tube in my chest that I was never going to be in that type of condition and not have her with me," he said. "At that point I was like, 'I'm going to marry her.'"

Johnson, who led the nation with 25 rushing touchdowns, returned to the field two weeks later to help the Broncos beat Nevada and clinch a spot in the Fiesta Bowl.

Before traveling to Arizona, he told Popadics' parents he planned to propose on Laguna Beach after the season. He also bought a ring.

Three days before facing the Sooners, a Fiesta Bowl liaison escorted several Boise State players to the Insight Bowl in Tempe, where Texas Tech rallied from a 31-point deficit against Minnesota to complete the largest comeback in FBS bowl history.

During the game, Johnson's teammates jokingly suggested other proposal alternatives.

"Then the liaison is like, 'What you really should do, you should score the game-winning touchdown and do it on national TV,'" Johnson recalled. "Everyone laughed and that was it. I didn't give it a second thought."

Earlier that season, the Broncos added the Statue of Liberty trick play to the playbook.

But during one practice, backup quarterback Nick Lomax, the 6-foot-7 son of former St. Louis Cardinals quarterback Neil Lomax, suggested a twist: What if Zabransky faked a throw, then gave it to Johnson with his offhand behind his back?

"And Coach Pete goes, 'Damn, Nick, that's a good idea,'" Zabransky said. "We knew then that was going to be a really, really good play."

The Broncos tried it against Idaho during the regular season and got a first down. They put it back in the game plan for Oklahoma but never found the right opportunity during regulation.

"Every time we got in the red zone, the backup QBs kept saying, 'Don't forget Statue,'" Petersen said. "But we kept not getting on the correct hash or the down-and-distance didn't seem exactly right."

After Perretta's overtime touchdown toss, Petersen still had Statue left on the play sheet. And because it was a 2-point conversion, the Broncos could place the ball on the left hash.

"So it's like, 'Yeah, that's the play,'" he said.

In the huddle, Zabransky told the offense, "Statue Left."

No one else said anything -- except offensive lineman Jadon Dailey.

"I'm getting goosebumps thinking about it now," Johnson said. "Dailey goes, 'All right, guys, let's party.'"

Before Boise could line up, Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops called timeout.

"Now, we have a long time to think about this," Petersen said. "And I'm like, 'Hey, you sure we're good with this play, guys?'"

Wide receivers coach Brent Pease immediately fired back: "Hell yes, we're good."

The Broncos hurried to the line and snapped the ball before the Sooners could make more adjustments. Zabransky faked throwing a bubble screen to the right and then held the ball behind his back for Johnson, who took it and dashed into the end zone behind All-America tackle Ryan Clady with no one in the way.

Amid the celebration, Johnson was about to go on TV for a postgame interview when Popadics appeared in front of him.

"That's when the light bulb goes off," he said. "I tell [Fox sideline reporter] Chris Myers, when you're done, hold the camera on me because I want to propose to my girlfriend."

Johnson kept his arm around Popadics as he answered football questions. Then, after the interview, he got down on one knee and proposed.

Popadics shouted, "Yes!" into the microphone.

"It's one thing to have a moment be that special for you and your wife," Johnson said. "It's something else to have it be memorable and special for other people and share that with them."

Back at the hotel, the two celebrated with friends and family over chicken wings and fries. Johnson also gave her the ring. Turned out, it was too small.

The next day, before they flew to New York to appear on ABC's "Good Morning America," Johnson and Popadics found a jeweler in Phoenix to resize the ring.

That summer, the two married in Boise. They now have three daughters.

"I've got four cheerleaders now," Johnson said.

Even now, as Johnson puts it, rarely a day goes by that someone doesn't come up and say, "I remember where I was."