The numbers are still hard to believe a decade later.

Jason Rivers caught 42 passes for 704 yards and six touchdowns in four games.

Four bowl games.

“There are some things that you cannot account for,” said Rivers, the University of Hawaii’s career receptions leader who was always at his best in big games. “That bowl atmosphere is something I lived for. Didn’t matter if it’s UAB or Georgia.”

Saturday will mark exactly 10 years since Rivers caught and ran his way into the NCAA record book. His 308 yards receiving against Arizona State in the Hawaii Bowl are still the most ever in any sanctioned college bowl game. Rivers had 14 catches in UH’s 41-24 win over the Sun Devils that capped Hawaii’s 11-3 season.

“I’ve never seen a better performance ever in any bowl game,” said Jeff Reinebold, who was on the UH coaching staff that year.

It was the third bowl win in a row for Rivers and UH. But it was also the last postseason victory for the Warriors, who can break that slump Saturday against Middle Tennessee in the Hawaii Bowl, UH’s first bowl game since 2010.

On Dec. 24, 2006, 40,623 watched from the Aloha Stadium stands as Arizona State led 10-3 at halftime. Then Colt Brennan threw five touchdown passes — two each to Rivers and Ryan Grice-Mullins — in the second half.

“I have vivid memories, even though the whole thing is a blur,” said Rivers, now a sales rep at Verizon in Honolulu and father of two young children. “I was on Cloud Nine.”

His first score, for 38 yards, tied the game at 10.

“On the previous possession, Colt threw a pick. The safety kept cheating, coming super flat,” Rivers recalled. “I told him, ‘I’m gonna pretend to stop and then go, just loft it up there.’ I walked into the end zone 20 yards from the nearest defender.”

Rivers remembers running back Nate Ilaoa knocking down ASU defenders like bowling pins, and Grice-Mullins’ two TDs giving UH a 24-10 lead after three quarters.

“Ryan, he juked their safety, who was supposed to be some kind of all-star, and ran past him on one of his touchdowns,” Rivers said.

Arizona State battled back early in the fourth quarter, but Brennan hit Davone Bess for a 21-yard TD. Then Rivers took a short slant 79 yards for the dagger with 2:01 left.

“Jason was always open,” UH receivers coach at the time, Ron Lee, said. “I was so glad he broke the record because I always had to find ways to keep them motivated. They all wanted the ball, but Colt could throw to just one each play. (Rivers) had an incredible game at the right time.”

It got Brennan into the record book, too: he emerged with the single-season record of 58 touchdown passes. And the team tied the 1992 Holiday Bowl championship squad for the program’s most wins in a season.

The victory over what is now known as a Power Five conference team, and a fairly talented one, caught the nation’s attention and UH was No. 24 in the final coaches poll.

With Brennan deciding to return for his senior year — and with Rivers, Bess and Grice-Mullins back for him to throw to — the June Jones-coached Warriors started the next season ranked in both polls.

Without that impressive showing in the last game of 2006, the undefeated 2007 run might have ended up short of a BCS bowl. But 12-0 against a weak schedule did get UH to the Sugar Bowl — partly due to a signature win in the previous year’s Hawaii Bowl.

“Hey, it was Arizona State,” Rivers said. “People doubting us in general saw it. Hawaii? For us to do that? We’re in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, but we ball out too.”

The party finally ended on New Year’s Day 2008, in the Superdome.

Despite a fourth postseason game of more than 100 receiving yards for Rivers (who is the only UH player ever to play in four bowl games), Hawaii was crushed by Georgia 41-10.

Hawaii has had just one winning season since, and that was six years ago.

“With (coach) Nick Rolovich there it definitely makes a difference,” Rivers said. “Rolo has the same way of bringing out the best in players that Coach Jones did. Getting to a bowl in his first year will propel them to the next phase of this rebuilding process. There’s more belief in themselves as a team and it will only get better for them.”

He hopes the freshmen can match his school record for bowl appearances, maybe surpass the three wins.

“Third down and long, fourth down and goal. I lived for that moment. The bowl game, the entire game is that moment,” Jason Rivers said. “I loved the lights.”

Reach Dave Reardon at dreardon@staradvertiser.com or 529-4783. His blog is at Hawaiiwarriorworld.com/quick-reads.