Grading Drew Allar’s performance in Penn State’s Fiesta Bowl win over Boise State

Finally, for the first time in his 11-year tenure at Penn State, James Franklin has made the College Football Playoff semifinal. Ironically, his Nittany Lions finally would have qualified for the four-team CFP in the first year of the 12-team format, but they easily breezed past SMU in the first round at Beaver Stadium and outlasted Boise State in the Fiesta Bowl quarterfinal on New Year’s Eve 31-14 to punch their ticket to the Orange Bowl semifinal. 

Same as years past, Franklin’s team has had a dominant run game and an excellent defense, but arguably the biggest difference, the one that finally has fans and the media feeling as though “Big Game James” can finally get over the hump, is that he has a superstar quarterback. The numbers may not show it, but Drew Allar was remarkable in the Fiesta Bowl, and though he’s announced his intention to return to Happy Valley for his senior season in 2025 and backup Beau Pribula has already transferred away, if Allar continues to play this well, the allure of being a top-five NFL draft pick this spring may be too hard to pass up. 

Allar continues to shoot up draft boards with NFL evaluators salivating over his big-time throws, but just how good was he on New Year’s Eve? Let’s dig into it. 

Drew Allar only completed 52% of his throws on Tuesday night, but he was so much more accurate than that, all while pushing the ball deep downfield. His adjusted completion percentage, which accounts for one official drop and a few other catchable balls that were not hauled in, was 63.6% with an average depth of target (ADOT) of 17.2. 

Allar attempted a season-high seven throws over 20 air yards downfield and connected on three for 62 yards and all three of his touchdowns. The bomb to Omari Evans was over 50 yards on the fly and dropped right in a bucket, but his first TD to Warren may have been even more impressive. Just watch this throw and consider the touch and accuracy you need to lead Tyler Warren perfectly to the back pylon. It sails perfectly over three defenders and Warren barely has to adjust. 

As a runner, Allar didn’t make much of an impact and his fumble was costly when Penn State had a chance to go up 21-0 and end the game in the first half. However, his heroics on the final drive of the half more than made up for it. 

Up 14-7 with 61 seconds remaining, Allar led the Nittany Lions on a nine-play 41-yard field goal drive to enter the break up 10, but with any other receiving group left in the CFP (save for Arizona State without Jordyn Tyson), it would have been a 14-point lead. Allar threw three perfect balls that should have been caught for touchdowns. First, a 38-yarder to Omari Evans at the front left pylon that he couldn’t come down with, then he dropped another one in a bucket to Harrison Wallace III from 23 yards out that should have been caught, and finally, a dart over the middle to Tyler Warren that went through his hands at the two-yard line. 

That drive alone should be enough for an NFL team to draft Allar in the first round. He proved he has every arrow in the quiver and all of his arm talent was on display. Aside from the first-half fumble and three sacks, which Allar has been excellent at avoiding all season, Allar was nearly perfect in the Fiesta Bowl. It’s hard to imagine a better game or a more underwhelming stat line to accompany it. 

Penn State has a serious lack of talent at wide receiver, and it will likely be the reason it falls short of a national championship. Even I was begging Andy Kotelnicki to run the ball more in the second half, but it had nothing to do with Allar’s ability to make the throws, that feeling said everything about Wallace and Evans’s inability to beat Boise State’s defensive backs consistently. 

Allar’s receivers went 5/10 on contest catch opportunities in this game and are 40/68 on the season, well over 50%, but that fails to capture how many excellent throws that group has failed to pay off with receptions and how many throws Allar passes up because of a lack of trust in his receivers against quality competition. 

Kotelnicki’s insistence on throwing the ball in the Fiesta Bowl, especially with downfield shots feels, in hindsight, as though he and Allar were testing the limits of their wide receivers in preparation for a matchup with Notre Dame or Georgia, whichever team prevails in Thursday’s Sugar Bowl. Allar’s arm has almost no limit, but his receivers have plenty of them, so he may need to be even better than an A+ for the Nittany Lions to win the Orange Bowl.