LARAMIE – For the third time in four weeks, Wyoming quarterback Josh Allen has been named one of the eight Manning Award Stars of the Week. The Manning Award is sponsored by the Allstate Sugar Bowl. Fans may vote for their top performer of the week on Facebook up until Thursday at 10 a.m., M.T.

Allen led Wyoming to a 34-33 win over No. 24 ranked San Diego State. Allen had 338 yards of total offense, accounting for 69.4 percent of Wyoming’s 487 yards of total offense.

Trailing by a touchdown with 10:45 remaining in the game, Wyoming took over at its own 25-yard line. On second down, Allen was flushed out to his right and hit senior wide receiver Jake Maulhardt for 45 yards as Allen was falling out of bounds. On the very next play, Allen would find Maulhardt again on the left sideline for 30 yards and a touchdown, tying the game at 27-27.

Wyoming did not lead in the game until taking a 34-27 lead with only 1:07 remaining in the game on a 29-yard touchdown pass from Allen to redshirt freshman wide receiver C.J. Johnson. It was a meticulous drive by the Pokes, going 85 yards in 15 plays and taking six minutes and 14 seconds off the clock. Of Allen’s 16 pass completions on the day 12 went for first downs (75.0 percent). He averaged 17.6 yards per pass completion.

Allen accounted for 10 big plays, including seven pass plays of 15 yards or more (33, 23, 19, 27, 45, 30 and 29) and three running plays of 10 yards or more (10, 12 and 12). Allen did an exceptional job of spreading the ball around, connecting with five different receivers. Four of those five receivers had three or more catches for 50 or more yards.

The other quarterbacks vying for this week’s Manning Award Star of the Week award are: Joshua Dobbs of Tennessee, Justin Herbert of Oregon, Sefo Liufau of Colorado, Marcus McMaryion of Oregon State, David Washington of Old Dominion, Will Worth of Navy and Arion Worthman of Air Force.

In its first 12 years, the Manning Award has recognized the top names in college football. It has honored quarterbacks from 11 different schools and from four different conferences. The Southeastern Conference leads the way with four Manning Award winners (Johnny Manziel, Cam Newton, JaMarcus Russell, Tim Tebow), while Texas is the only school with two winners (Colt McCoy and Vince Young). Deshaun Watson of Clemson was the 2015 winner of the Manning award and was the third winner from the Atlantic Coast Conference, joining Matt Ryan (Boston College, 2007) and Jameis Winston (Florida State, 2013).

All of the Manning Award winners follow in the footsteps of the Mannings themselves. In college, Archie, Peyton and Eli Manning combined for over 25,000 passing yards and 201 touchdowns while playing in 10 bowl games and earning four bowl MVP awards. Archie was the No. 2 pick in the NFL Draft, while both Peyton and Eli were selected No. 1 overall.

In addition to the Manning Award’s yearly honor, each week during the regular season, eight quarterbacks are recognized as Manning Quarterbacks of the Week. Fifty-five players from 52 different schools were honored during the 2015 season.

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