San Diego State aspired to be this year's Houston.
Instead, the Aztecs find themselves playing Houston in this year's Las Vegas Bowl. The matchup was announced on Sunday. The Las Vegas Bowl is among the games kicking of the bowl season, scheduled for Dec. 17 (12:30 p.m., ABC) at UNLV's Sam Boyd Stadium.
"This is a special year for the Las Vegas Bowl and we have a special matchup to go with it," said John Saccenti, executive director of the Las Vegas Bowl. "Houston is one of college football's most exciting teams and we are excited to be able to match the Cougars against a 10-win conference champion in San Diego State. It will be our first Texas team playing a program that hasn't been in our game since 1998 so our entire city is looking forward to celebrating our 25th year with these two great programs and their fans."
Houston was the darling of college football last season when the Cougars went from unranked in the preseason to a Peach Bowl victory over Florida State and No. 8 spot in the 2015 final rankings.
The Cougars (9-3) opened this season as the favorite to represent the Group of Five in a New Year's Bowl game, but didn't live up to those expectations. They do have two wins against highly-ranked teams, however, beating both Oklahoma and Louisville when those teams were ranked No. 3 in the nation.
The Aztecs have played Houston twice through the years, losing 14-9 at home in 1973 and 49-14 at Houston in 1972.
SDSU (10-3) is coming off a 27-24 victory over Wyoming in Saturday's Mountain West Championship Game, giving the Aztecs back-to-back conference titles.
Houston comes into the game with the nation's No. 3-ranked rushing defense (97.9 rushing yards per game) facing SDSU running back D.J. Pumphrey as he bids to become the NCAA's all-time leading rusher. Pumphrey has 6,290 career yards, just 107 yards away from Wisconsin's Ron Dayne (6,397).
