Football bowl games have long been played by some of the best college football teams. The end-of-season tradition started as a single game and has grown to 15 major games with teams vying all season long for a coveted spot in the bowl games. Teams fight for recognition as the best in their conference for the chance to play for a national championship in front of a bowl crowd.
Early Bowl Games
In 1901, the Tournament of Roses committee hosted the first post-season college football game. After a lopsided score of 49 to 0, the game was replaced with chariot races. In 1916, the Tournament of Roses game was brought back. Seven years later, it was renamed the Rose Bowl after it was moved to a new stadium by the same name. In 1933, Miami introduced the Palm Festival featuring another post season college game. Two years later, Miami changed the name of the game to the Orange Bowl; the festival was renamed the Orange Bowl Festival. The same year the Sugar Bowl began, followed by the Sun Bowl in 1936 and the Cotton Bowl in 1937. Throughout the 1930s, more than 100 post-season games were played as a way to raise money for various charities.
Before Organized Bowl Agreements
Before an organized bowl agreement was put into place in 1992, each bowl game had agreements with specific college conferences. While this arrangement worked well for the bowls and conferences alike, it kept some of the best teams from playing against each other. Conference champions often could not play against each other to determine national champions because they were already committed to play in separate bowl games.
Early Bowl Agreements
In 1992, many conference commissioners, four bowl committees and athletic representatives agreed to a bowl agreement named the Bowl Coalition. The coalition allowed the conferences and bowl committees to pair the champions of the Big East Conference, Atlantic Coast Conference and Notre Dame with the champion of the Big Eight Conference, Southeastern Conference or Southwestern Conference. In the three years the Bowl Coalition was in effect, organizers were able to pair the number 1 and number 2 teams to compete for a national championship twice. In 1995, the bowl and conference relationships were changed so the historical bowl games could be retained while the chance for number 1 and number 2 teams to meet would increase. Now called the Bowl Alliance, the agreement stayed in place through the 1997 football season.
Bowl Championship Series
In 1997, the Pac-10 and Big Ten conferences joined ranks with the other conferences to form the Bowl Championship Series. The BCS was designed to put the top two college football teams into a national championship game. A mathematical formula, the BCS standings, was put into place to determine the participants of the rest of the participating bowl games. Over the next seven years, changes were put into place to help produce quality bowl games including removing the margin of victory rankings. As of 2011, the BCS standings consisted of six computerized rankings and two human poll rankings. The BCS is set to continue setting bowl games until at least the 2014 football season.
Member Comments