1978 Garden State Bowl , part of the 1978 bowl game season , took place on December 16 , 1978 , at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford , New Jersey . The competing teams were the Rutgers Scarlet Knights , which competed as a football independent , and the Arizona State Sun Devils , representing the Pacific-10 Conference ( Pac-10 ) . In the inaugural edition of the Garden State Bowl , Arizona State came-from-behind to defeat Rutgers 34 – 18
football independent
NCAA Division I FBS independent schools
1978 Garden State Bowl