Rose Bowl: Germaine saves the day for Ohio State and ruins the year for Plummer and Arizona State, 20-17.

Ohio State, on a substitute quarterback’s touchdown pass, won college football’s 83rd Rose Bowl game Wednesday, 20-17, over an Arizona State team that was 19 seconds from a perfect season and a possible national championship.

On a murky day in Pasadena before a crowd of 100,635, Buckeye sophomore Joe Germaine--a spectator himself until well into the second quarter--found freshman David Boston wide open, and lobbed him the ball. The five-yard touchdown stunned the Sun Devils, who had just taken a 17-14 lead on Jake Plummer’s 11-yard run with 1:40 to play.

“How about a guy from Scottsdale who comes back and beats his hometown people?” Coach John Cooper shouted to Ohio State’s fans after the game, alluding to Germaine, who grew up watching Arizona State football and spent last season at Scottsdale Community College in Arizona.

Victory was equally sweet for Cooper, who left Arizona State’s program for Ohio State’s, only to become the first man since 1918 to coach two schools to a Rose Bowl championship. (Hugo Bezdek previously did it, with Oregon in 1917 and a U.S. Marine Corps team a year later.)

It was Cooper who gave Germaine his only start of the season Nov. 23 in Columbus, then had to answer for it when Ohio State lost to archrival Michigan, 13-9, without scoring a touchdown. Those four points are now all that separate the Big Ten champions from an undefeated record.

They will be attentive viewers of tonight’s Sugar Bowl game, where, if third-ranked Florida can upset No. 1 Florida State, a slim chance exists for the fourth-ranked Buckeyes to rate consideration for the national championship.

“It’s out of our hands,” said Germaine, voted the Rose Bowl’s most valuable player. “We did our part.”

He certainly did his. With the Buckeyes seemingly about to suffer their fifth consecutive Rose Bowl defeat, Germaine drove them 65 yards in 12 plays, helped enormously by two calls of pass interference against Arizona State, the second of which put the ball at the Sun Devil five.

The Sun Devils dug in, none more so than cornerback Marcus Soward, the senior from Rialto who was found guilty on the interference call.

But with Boston able to slip free, Germaine saw the freshman wide receiver standing by himself, two yards from the goal line, and flipped him the ball. Boston did a strut in the end zone, celebrating with 19 seconds remaining and Ohio State all but assured of its first Rose Bowl victory since Jan. 1, 1974.

Arizona State got one last shot, but all Plummer could do was complete two passes that took the Sun Devils to the Buckeye 35 as time expired. They did have one timeout remaining, but weren’t able to call it.

“A couple of tick-tick-ticks left, we might have gotten a field goal and gone into overtime,” Plummer said. “But that’s the way it goes. That’s why they got a clock.”

Third in the Heisman Trophy voting, Plummer spent most of the day being pressured by Ohio State’s defense, one of the country’s toughest. He dumped a number of short passes to his backs, and the only touchdown pass Plummer threw was a 25-yarder caught by a diving Ricky Boyer that possibly wasn’t caught, TV replays indicating that the ball might have touched the ground.

In the end, though, Plummer showed what made him a great leader, scrambling 11 yards for a touchdown with 1:40 to play, when it appeared Ohio State was about to sack him for the seventh time.

The play gave the Sun Devils the lead for only the second time all day, 17-14. Plummer was mobbed by his teammates. The school’s first national title was in sight.

And Ohio State, to many, looked beaten, but not to Plummer.

“I only celebrated for a second,” Plummer said. “You do all that ‘Yeah! Yeah! Yahoo!’ but then things happen like what just happened to us. I was worried the whole time.”

Plummer wrapped up his NCAA career by completing 19 of 35 passes for 201 yards. He was intercepted once--the only turnover of a well-played game--when a pass bounced off a receiver’s hands directly to an Ohio State linebacker, Andy Katzenmoyer.

The Sun Devil quarterback was “as good as advertised,” the Buckeyes’ Cooper had to admit.

But he had a pretty fair quarterback of his own. In fact, two of them.

To start the Rose Bowl game, Cooper returned to his original quarterback, Stanley Jackson, to run the offense. Jackson played the first four possessions, and even threw a nine-yard touchdown pass to Boston, in running his record to 11-0 as Ohio State’s starter.

Boston’s catch was a beauty, as he tight-roped the right corner of the end zone to stay in bounds.

But after giving way to Germaine with 5 1/2 minutes remaining until halftime and the score tied, 7-7, Jackson never returned.

Germaine reported for duty, just as he had in Ohio State’s previous 10 victories. He completed nine of 17 passes for 131 yards and two touchdowns, much to the chagrin--but hardly to the surprise--of Arizona State’s coach, Bruce Snyder, who said later, “I admire Joe, and know him and his family so well.”

Arizona State had tied the score on Boyer’s acrobatic catch, with 10:04 remaining in the second quarter. After a Plummer pump fake, Boyer went streaking down the left sideline. He slipped behind Antoine Winfield of the Buckeyes, went leaping for the ball and came down with it in the end zone, ball first. It appeared trapped, but was ruled a touchdown.

One series later, Cooper changed quarterbacks.

The effect wasn’t immediate. Neither side scored again before halftime, and Arizona State went ahead, 10-7, early in the third quarter on a Robert Nycz field goal from 37 yards.

Coming out throwing, however, practically from his end zone, Germaine found flanker Dimitrious Stanley over the middle for 16 yards and some breathing room. On the next play, the same combination connected, again over the middle, for 72 yards, the longest touchdown pass in Buckeye bowl history.

Germaine was given plenty of time to throw by Ohio State’s offensive line, anchored by 330-pound NFL prospect Orlando Pace.

Pace, when he wasn’t busy blocking for Germaine, said, “You could just look in Joe’s eyes and see the determination.”

For the next eight series, no one scored. Ohio State’s 14-10 advantage appeared as though it might hold up.

A blocked kick turned the tide. Josh Jackson took aim on a 37-yard field goal that would put the Buckeyes ahead by seven points, but defensive end Brent Burnstein, who stands 6 feet 8 inches, leaped to block it for the Sun Devils. It was scooped up by Damien Richardson, whose lateral led to Derrick Rodgers running to the end zone and somersaulting into it. It was judged an illegal forward lateral, though, and brought back.

That didn’t faze Plummer.

He flipped short passes to Keith Poole and Jeff Paulk, then a 29-yarder on fourth down to a jumping Lenzie Jackson to the Ohio State eight. With the crowd on its feet, Plummer was sacked by Buckeye linebacker Greg Bellisari, back to the 11. But on third down, Plummer was chased from the pocket by Katzenmoyer, who got a hand on him, and went diving into the end zone. The Sun Devils led, 17-14.

The roses were almost theirs.

Back came the Buckeyes, with three hookups from Germaine to Stanley, twice converting on third down. Pass interference took the ball to the 19. And then again on third down, Germaine dropped to pass. He missed his man, but Soward was whistled for interference, riding the receiver’s back. The ball was moved to the Arizona State five. It was an automatic first down, but only 24 seconds remained for Germaine.

It was Joe versus the Sun Devils.

He nodded to Boston, who knew what it meant. And with one last pass, Germaine beat the team for which he once dreamed of playing. Arizona State ended up with a record of 11-1, same as Ohio State’s, but the end result left Arizona State’s coach needing to decide which team he would vote No. 1 in America, rather than his own.

“I don’t know yet,” an emotional Snyder said, asked for whom he would vote. “I’m just trying to get through this.”

So was Soward, who stood motionless on the field after the game for several minutes, helmet in hand.

He watched Ohio State celebrate, and a dream season disappear.