from rocky mountain news

See, the FBS is the only NCAA sport that does not have an official tournament or playoffs to determine the winner of the season. Yes, there is a BCS Championship Game and the winner is declared the national champ but…. those two teams that go to the BCS game are handpicked according to stats, rankings and other random criteria that have been interpreted by a panel of “experts.” They don’t play in a post-season elimination to see who is the best. This leaves the season’s true winner wide open for debate.

So basically, last year the panel said “hmmm, we think Florida and Oklahoma are the two best teams this year.” And then Florida and Oklahoma got to be in the big game for the 2008-09 season.
And last year, I’m sure Florida and Oklahoma were thrilled. Utah, USC and Texas, however, were not. I know, it sounds like sour grapes, jealousy or sore losers but it’s not.

All three of them believed they were the No. 1 team last season and wanted to have their chance to prove it in the championship game. Utah won its post season bowl game and was the only team to go undefeated in the 08-09 season—unlike the two teams that were chosen as the best teams in the country to play for the championship game.

There is a ton of controversy around the BCS rankings and decisions. Utah is not the first undefeated team to be left out of the championship game. It actually happens quite a bit! In fact, the BCS rankings, especially for the championship game are so controversial that the Associated Press asked for their poll to be removed from decision making process. The AP Poll features the Top 25 rankings according to sportswriters and analysts from all over the country.

Even though the BCS declares the winner of the championship as the No. 1 team of the season, the AP Poll does not always agree. There technically is no college football national champion. The BCS National Championship Game is affectionately known as the Mythical National Championship.

So who will be this year’s Mythical National Champs? The Texas Longhorns or the Alabama Crimson Tide

**What really sucks for the 2010 BCS Championship is right at the beginning of the 1st quarter, Texas Heisman Nominated QB Colt McCoy was hit hard with a major shoulder injury and had to be replaced by a freshman backup. So it’s like a championship between the No. 1 team, and a No. 16 team…. very sad. You almost want them to call the game and do it again another day because even when ‘Bama wins, everyone will always say “wonder what would have happened if McCoy stayed in…..”

Eh, not so much no.

The Big 5 Bowl Games that make up the BCS (Rose, Sugar, Fiesta, Orange, BCS Title) are the ones that feature the best teams in the country and are the ones that everyone is eagerly anticipating. But there are 29 other bowl games to tune into! The first game is the New Mexico Bowl on Dec 19th featuring Fresno State and Wyoming. Can’t make it without college football until then? The FCS (or Football Championship Subdivision of NCAA football) is in their final championship stretch until Dec 18. NCAA.Com has the full schedule.

Here is a quick rundown of the BCS Bowl Games that were announced during Selection Sunday. As January grows closer we’ll be doing an in depth analysis of each games. Well, okay, we’ll be doing some kind of analysis…….

Rose Bowl see my blog about the pretty Rose Bowl for additional information.

• Features the Big 10 and the Pac 10.
• Played in Rose Bowl Stadium in Pasadena, California.
• 2009 is the 95th anniversary of the Rose Bowl (in it’s current stadium. It has been around since 1902 in other forms)
• Brought to us by citi.
• January 1: #8 Ohio State (10-2)  vs. #7 Oregon (10-2) 4:30 p.m.
  

Orange

• Features the champion of the Atlantic Coast Conference.
• 2009 is the 75th anniversary of the Orange Bowl.
• Played in Dolphin Stadium in Miami, Florida
• Brought to us by FedEx
• January 5: #10  Iowa (10-2) vs. Georgia  Tech (11-2) 8 p.m.
  

Sugar

• Features the champion of Southeastern Conference
• 2009 is the 75th anniversary of the Sugar Bowl
• Played in the Superdome in New Orleans, Louisiana
• Brought to us by Allstate
• Because Florida, champ of the SEC, was chosen for the Championship game this year the Sugar Bowl features 2 randoms instead of 1:
• January 1: #5 Florida (12-1) vs. #3 Cincinnati (12-0) 8:30 p.m. Florida, who was ranked No.1 until their devastating loss to Alabama in the SEC Championship got bumped to No. 5 in the ranks, but is still considered by many to be the elite team and the one to really beat.
  

Fiesta:

• Features the champion of the Big 12 Conference
• Played at the University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Arizona
• 2009 is the 38th anniversary of the Fiesta Bowl
• Brought to us by Tostitos
• January 4: #4 TCU (12-0) vs. #6  Boise State (13-0) 8:00 p.m. Both teams were undefeated this season and should be a good game, yet highly anti-climatic. Would be much more noteworthy if they were playing a big name instead of each other.

BCS National Championship:

• Features the #1 and #2 Ranked teams in the BCS standings
• Is held every year at one of the BCS Bowl sites
• This year it is held in the Rose Bowl Stadium in Pasadena, California
• January 8: #1 Alabama (13-0) vs. #2 Texas (13-0) 8:00 p.m.  Both teams have had more bowl appearances than any other team. Alabama 57 bowls, Texas 49. The game pitts Heisman Trophy nominees Mark Ingram (Crimson Tide) and Colt McCoy (Longhorns) against each other. Alabama clinched the No. 1 spot after their beatdown of the Florida Gators in the SEC Championship.
  

Okay. So, in college, the divisions are DI, DII, and DIII. Division I is the best so that is the one we are going to focus on. Within each division there are conferences. And then….within that structure, there are actually two subdivisions.

1. Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS)
2. Football Championship Subdivision (FCS)

The teams that make up the FBS are the games that everyone tunes into. In fact, when I started to tell my roommate (a huge Ohio State fanatic) about all I had learned about the FBS and the FCS, he looked at me like I grew seven heads and said “um yeah, no one cares about that. The FBS  games are what we watch.”

So why aren’t all teams in the elite FBS? Because the NCAA divides the DI schools into division based on their attendance at games and their scholarships (in other words, do they have enough cash and financial backing for their program to be in the elite).

The FBS

The Football Bowl Subdivision is comprised of

• Six “Powerhouse” Conferences. They are like the A-list celebrities that you want at your party.
• The “Mid-Majors” The high end B-listers.
• The Independents: The randoms celebs that everyone accepts as must-haves at the party, but have no idea why… like Paris Hilton….

In 2009, there are 120 schools that make up the FBS. More can join every year as long as they prove themselves worthy.

The Football Championship Conference is comprised of the other conferences. In other words, these are the people at the party that can provide good entertainment value but no one really cares if they don’t show up.

Oh and one more point, conferences with 12 or more schools are allowed to split into more divisions (i.e. east/west) and can have divisional championship games within their own conference.

The Powerhouse FBS Conferences:

The Atlantic Conference (ACC)
East                                                                  West
Boston College                                        Virginia Tech
Clemson                                                    Georgia Tech
Florida State                                           Miami
Maryland                                                 Virginia
North Carolina State                           North Carolina
Wake Forest                                           Duke

The Big East
Cincinnati
USF
Pittsburgh
UConn
Syracuse
West Virginia
Louisville
Rutgers

The Big 10
Michigan
Purdue
Penn State
Ohio State
Wisconsin
Northwestern
Minnesota
Mich State
Iowa
Indiana
Illinois

The Big 12

Colorado                                 Baylor
Iowa State                              Oklahoma
Kansas                                    Oklahoma State
Kansas State                          Texas
Missouri                                 Texas A&M
Nebraska                                Texas Tech

Pacific-10:
USC
UCLA
Stanford
Oregon
Arizona
Washington
California
Wash State
Arizona State
Oregon State

Southeastern Conference (SEC):
Arkansas
Alabama
Florida
Georgia,
Kentucky
Vanderbilt
Mississippi
Tennessee
Auburn
Mississippi State
South Carolina

The Mid-Majors:

I’m not going to spend time running through all the teams in these conferences.

• Conference USA:
• Mid-American (MAC):
• Mountain West:
• Sun Belt
• Western Athletic (WAC)

The FBS Independents

Somewhere in between the Powerhouses and the Mid-Majors come the Independents. They split from their conferences for various reasons but still participate in the high profile games.
They are:

• Notre Dame
• Army
• Navy

The FCS

The rest of Division I college football conferences make up the Football Championship Subdivision.

These conferences don’t partake in the whole Bowl Phenomenon that everyone else is so crazy about. Mostly because of financing. The schools in these conferences don’t pull in enough attendance and financial backing to support a bowl game. Instead, they have a 16 team elimination process/playoffs at the end of their season—like most other NCAA sports.

I’m not going to go too in depth with the FCS because, like I said earlier, all of the attention in college football is on the FBS but here is a quick rundown of the conferences:

Big Sky, Big South, Colonial Athletic, Great West, FCS Independents, Ivy League, Mid-Eastern Athletic, Missouri Valley, Northeastern, Ohio Valley, Patriot, Pioneer, Southern, Southland, Southwestern Athletic.

The FBS & The BCS

As if it wasn’t confusing enough, the college football bigwigs created the Bowl Championship Series (BCS) to really complicate it.

So remember those six powerhouse conferences of the FBS? Not only do they make up the core of the Football Bowl Subdivision, they are also the six BCS conferences.

Breaking it Down:
Let’s take the Florida Gators (Go Gators!) as the example.
Florida is in the Southeastern Conference (SEC) so: The Florida Gators are in a powerhouse conference in both the Football Bowl Subdivision and the Bowl Championship Series.
Memorize that. It will score major brownie points (although, not if the crew you are out with are FSU or Oklahoma fans!)

So what’s the deal with the BCS?
Way back in the beginning there was only one bowl: The Rose. By the 1940s it grew to 5 and in the ’70s swelled to 11. Currently there are 34 college football bowls, So over the course of time, and as more and more bowl games started to pop up in the post season, the elite wanted to separate themselves from the pack.

The BCS is made up of five key bowl games: The Rose, The Orange, The Sugar, The Fiesta, and the Bowl National Championship Game. Think of them as the Limoges of college football bowls.

Each bowl features a conference and the top ranked team of the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-10 and SEC have an automatic place in their host’s bowl (i.e. the ACC hosts the Orange Bowl so the No. 1 team in the ACC automatically gets to play in the game). Oh, and Notre Dame automatically gets to go if they are ranked in the top 8 because their athletics director helps with BCS standings and decisions. (Sure, that seems fair and not at all like bribery).

In addition to competing to be No. 1 in their respective conferences, all the teams are battling to be the No. 1 and No. 2 ranked BCS teams in the country because those two head to the BCS National Championship Game. The winner of that game is declared the national champ and No. 1 team in the country for the season. To some people.

How it works:

The BCS uses a very complicated set of stats, polls and math to determine the top teams in the country. This is widely debated and topic of controversy every season. I would break it down, but I really have no idea. Even seasoned college football fans have a hard time understanding how the rankings come to be. Because shock of all shocks, they had to go and make it all complicated with all sorts of crazy rules. Think I’m kidding? Check out the BCS Football Selection Procedures if you don’t believe me.

One rule that you should be aware of is that a team cannot play in a BCS Bowl came and then compete in the BCS National Championship.

Take last year for example. Oklahoma was the No. 1 team for the Big 12, meaning they had an automatic spot in the Fiesta Bowl. And Florida was the No. 1 team for the SEC, meaning they should play in the Sugar Bowl. But the BCS committee determined that Florida and Oklahoma were the No. 1 and No. 2 teams in the country and wanted them to be in the Championship. So they were. And Texas played in the Fiesta Bowl in Oklahoma’s spot and Alabama was selected to play in the Sugar Bowl. The newly selected teams do not have to be a part of the host’s original conference (Big 12, SEC in this case).

Yes, my head hurts too from all of this. But apparently it has really helped college football because it was all chaotic before they installed this system. Hmm.

College football has it’s own cult-like following. Sure the rules and basics are pretty much the same as the NFL but the atmosphere and fanaticism surrounding the game is completely different. These fans are straight up CRAZY. Check out any game on a Saturday in the fall and you will be shocked to see the stadium. Ohio State’s stadium holds well over 100,000 people and they are sold out almost every game. And the fans are all dressed head to toe in red.

The strange thing is that even though they really are the same game, most football fans like one or the other; not both college and professional football.

For all intents and purposes,  there are 7 major differences in college vs. NFL. (There are other minor ones but seriously, no one cares.)

I once read, “The biggest difference between college football games and NFL football is that NFL players are considered professionals and are paid more. “

Pardon my French, but, no shit. That quote came from an actual website, but to protect the moronic writer that actually put that on paper, er, blog, I won’t say where. The other difference that they listed was “NFL players are bigger than college players because they work out more since they have paid personal trainers.” Bloody brilliant.

While yes, both of those are true, they are not real distinguishing characteristics between professional and college football. Those are:

1. There is No Two-Minute Warning in college football: This is key factor close games when time is running down. At the two-minute mark in the NFL, there is a mandatory time-out—or pause in the game—that is not attributed to either team. Gives the team time to regroup and plan. But at the college level, there is no stop of game.
2. The Two-Point Conversion Starts on the 3rd yard line. In the NFL, it starts from the second yard line. (In other words, in college they try from farther away then in the pros)
3. Knee-Down: The most important difference between college football and the NFL is that in college, if you are carrying/catching the ball and one of your knees hits the grass, you are done. The play is over. It doesn’t matter if you were tackled or you just tripped over your own two feet; the play is done. In the NFL, you have to be forced down., meaning if you slip and fall and the other team doesn’t touch you, you can get up and keep on running.
4. The Game Clock: In college football, the game clock stops whenever a first down is achieved, but in the NFL the clock continues to run after a first down (unless the player goes out of bounds or a time out is called). Why is this important? If a team is losing and the clock stops after every first down, it gives the losing college team more time to make a comeback.
5. The Almost-Out-of-Bounds Catch/Pass Reception: In college football, the receiver must have control of the ball and get one foot down in-bounds for it to be considered a catch. In the NFL, the receiver must have control of the ball and get both feet down. As college players mature, you’ll see them getting both feet down in bounds to show that they have the awareness to play in the NFL.
6. Overtime: In college, when a game goes to overtime, each team is given equal opportunity to try and score. They each get a turn (possession) from the opponent’s 25 yard line. There is a coin toss and the winner chooses to kick first (defense) or to receive first (offense). The team winning after both teams get a chance to score is declared the winner. In this case, being the defense first is actually a good thing because you get the last shot to score.

• Also, in college football, there is no such thing as a tie. Overtime continues until someone wins.
• In the NFL, when a game goes to overtime, the teams play a sudden-death quarter. They also do a coin toss to determine who will kick and receive. But in the NFL, the first team to score by any means, wins the game. In this case you always want to be the offense first because if the other team scores first, the game is over and you don’t even get to try to score.
• In the regular season, if no one scores after the first OT, the game is declared a tie. In the post season, however, the game goes until there is a clear winner.

Hash Marks. Ah, the hash marks. I had to read 6 different websites, ask on Twitter and annoy my roommate before I finally understood the hash marks. That’s how abstract the definitions were.

Here is my best translation: It may appear like every play takes place in the dead center of the field. It actually does not. If you look, there are two “dashed” lines running down the field that mimic the markers on the sidelines that show what yard the players are on. These dashed lines, or hash marks, are used for ball placement prior to most offensive plays. By having those dashes in the middle, it actually makes the field and area for game play, more wide open.

Ok got that part? Go ahead, read it again. I actually recommend looking at the field or a game while reading it; that’s what helped me.

So in the NFL, each of those hashes are about 70ft away from the sideline, meaning the space between them is 18’6” wide . In college, those lines are only 60 ft away from the sideline, meaning the playing space in between is about 40 feet (or 20 feet greater than in the NFL). Remember this, it will be important in a few minutes.

Still with me? I promise we are getting to the point.

If the dead ball (player was tackled, etc) occurred in between those hash marks, the next play starts exactly where the ball went down. However….. if the dead ball happened outside the hash marks, that is not the case. Let’s say a player ran the ball out of bounds at the 20 yard line. The next play would not start on the out of bounds line on the 20 yard line nor would it be returned to the dead center of the field. The ball gets placed on the closest 20 yard hash mark.

Um. Ok. Why?
Well, if the ball was placed where it went out of bounds, the offense would be completely restricted. Think about it. They couldn’t pass or run to the right (or left depending on the play) because they would be immediately out of bounds. So instead, the ball is moved to the hash mark to give the offense the opportunity to go right or left. It opens up the field.

Go ahead, read it again. I had to.
Okay so remember like 10 minutes ago when I said that 20 foot difference from college to NFL would be important later? Since the college lines are closer to the sidelines, their field of play is actually 20 feet larger than the NFL’s.

One final note on this. Hash marks/ball placement play a big role for the kicker too. It always seems like they are kicking from dead center but they are not. For field goals, sometimes they are right or left….justified….and that changes the entire angle of their kick.

Ok, now go take a break. Get some chocolate. Watch something ubergirly. you so deserve it!

Here’s last night’s recap:

One Tree Hill: Peyton is pregnant! Nate got the point guard position with Charleston. And they got Q’s killer

The Bachelor: OH MY GOD! So in love with Jason, the single dad star of this season. He is like, the perfect dream guy.

yum! The new McDreamy...

Oh…wait…you wanted:

The Fiesta Bowl Recap

You can read this 6 line game summary in 1 minute or head to ESPN.com to find the really long, drawn out non girl-friendly version that took me 15 minutes to decipher. The last 5 minutes of the game were all you really needed to know.

• With about 8:00 remaining in the game, the Texas Longhorns were leading 17-9
• Then the Ohio State Buckeyes went buck-crazy (always wanted to try to say that in conversation…)
• First, Terrelle Pryor ran in a 5-yard touchdown to bring the score to 17-15
• Then, right before the 2 minute warning, Dan Herron scored to give the Buckeyes a 21-17 lead.
• But…the play of the game came from the Longhorns:

With 0:16 left to play, Cort McCoy passed to Quan Cosby who ran 26-yards and dove into the game winning touchdown.

Final: Texas 23 Ohio State 21

up next: My Pick for the BCS on Jan 8th.

**One Tree Hill involved basketball and they talked about Seattle Seahawks on the Bachelor, therefore those are sports recaps also, ha!

*revised 12/06/09 for the 2009-10 Bowl Season

Currently there are 34 college football bowls, some bigger than others. What’s a bowl? Clearly you missed A Girl’s Guide to the Bowls Part I, so go back and read it!

I was going to break it all down for you but, well, I don’t want to! Because shock of all shocks, they had to go and make it all complicated to figure out with all sorts of crazy rules. Think I’m kidding? Check out the BCS Football Selection Procedures if you don’t believe me.

I’m going to try to give you some stuff about the Bowl Championship Series. These are the one’s people get really into (think of them as the Limoges of football bowls.) At the bottom is a list of all the others and a link to wikipedia for the 2008-2009 Bowl breakdown including who won!

In the beginning there was only one bowl: the Rose. By the 40s it grew to 5 and in the 70s swelled to 11. Now, three of the original five college football bowls are part of the BSC. Only now they are brought to us by very rich sponsors!

How it works:

The BCS uses rankings to determine the top two teams in the country. The top two then head to the National Championship Game.

The rest of the bowls have their own selection process too. Each bowl features a conference and the top ranked team of the Atlantic Coast, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-10 and Southeastern conferences have an automatic berths in their host’s bowl. Then the bowl picks the oppponent based on that whole selection process mentioned earlier. Oh and Notre Dame automatically gets to go if they are ranked in the top 8. Cause their athletics director helps with BCS standings and decisions. Huh. That seems fair and not at all like bribery.

There are a lot of other rules too like what happens if the team picked for the National Championship Game was supposed to be in the Rose Bowl? It’s very complicated. But basically, they fight about it a bit, the team goes to the big game and then the Bowl gets to pick another team from the pool of eligible teams.

This whole thing made my head hurt. But apparently it has really helped college football because it was all chaotic before they installed this system. Hmm.

But here is what you need to know about the BCS. I welcome any input on this because it’s way over my head still. Not for beginners! Maybe by next football season I’ll be able to understand it all!

Rose Bowl see my blog about the pretty Rose Bowl for additional information.

• Features the Big 10 and the Pac 10.
• Played in Rose Bowl Stadium in Pasadena, California.
• 2009 is the 95th anniversary of the Rose Bowl (in it’s current stadium. It has been around since 1902 in other forms)
• Brought to us by citi.
• January 1: Ohio State vs. Oregon 4:30 p.m.
  

Orange

• Features the champion of the Atlantic Coast Conference.
• 2009 is the 75th anniversary of the Orange Bowl.
• Played in Dolphin Stadium in Miami, Florida
• Brought to us by FedEx
• January 5: Iowa vs. Georgia Tech 8 p.m.
  

Sugar

• Features the champion of Southeastern Conference
• 2009 is the 75th anniversary of the Sugar Bowl
• Played in the Superdome in New Orleans, Louisiana
• Brought to us by Allstate
• Because Florida, champ of the SEC, was chosen for the Championship game this year the Sugar Bowl features 2 randoms instead of 1:
• January 1: Florida vs. Cincinnati 8:30 p.m.
  

Fiesta:

• Features the champion of the Big 12 Conference
• Played at the University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Arizona
• 2009 is the 38th anniversary of the Fiesta Bowl
• Brought to us by Tostitos
• January 4: TCU vs. Boise State 8:00 p.m. Both teams were undefeated this season.

BCS National Championship:

• Features the #1 and #2 Ranked teams in the BCS standings
• Is held every year at one of the BCS Bowl sites
• This year it is held in the Rose Bowl Stadium in Pasadena, California
• January 8: Alabama vs. Texas 8:00 p.m.  Both teams have had more bowl appearances than any other team. Alabama 57 bowls, Texas 49. The game pitts Heisman Trophy nominees Mark Ingram (Crimson Tide) and Colt McCoy (Longhorns) against each other.

———————————-

The Non BCS Bowls are as follows:

EagleBank, New Mexico, St. Petersburg, Las Vegas, New Orleans, Poinsettia, Hawaii, Motor City, Meinieke Car Care Bowl, Champs Sports, Emerald, Independence, Papajohns, Valero Energy, Roady’s, Humanitarian, Pacific Life Holiday, Texas, Bell Helicopters Armed Forces, Gaylord Hotels Music City, Insight, Chick-fil-A, Outback, Gator, Captiol One, Liberty, International, GMAC, Sun, Cotton

The NCAA College Football Bowls and their 2009-2010 Breakdowns or check out last years:

The NCAA College Football Bowls and their 2008-2009 Breakdowns

go back to A Girl’s Guide to the Bowls Part II: The Pretty Rose Bowl

or back to A Girl’s Guide to the Bowls Part I

Or if you want to get Direct TV to watch all the bowl games this year check out: DIRECT TV

I read the origins but I am not entirely convinced that this still isn’t a big ploy to get women to watch football. It’s roses! We are suckers for flowers!

look how pretty football can be!

To understand the Rose Bowl you have to first understand it’s humble beginnings:

The Parade

Then: Historic floats from the Parade of Roses

• On January 1, 1890 in Pasasdena, California, the Tournament of Roses Parade began
• The Parade was started as a way for the Valley Hunt Club to show off their nice sunny California homes to folks back East that were cold and buried in snow (how exactly, I do not know. It’s not like it was televised or put on Youtube….)

According to Wikipedia, Professor Charles F. Holder had announced:

“In New York, people are buried in the snow. Here our flowers are blooming and our oranges are about to bear. Let’s hold a festival to tell the world about our paradise.” And so the Club organized Horse-drawn carriages covered in flowers, followed by foot races, polo matches, and a game of tug-of-war on the town lot attracted a crowd of 2000 to the event. Upon seeing the scores of flowers on display, the Professor decided to suggest the name “Tournament of Roses.”

• The Parade began adding marching bands and motorized floats. After about 11 years, the East finally took notice. Maybe because they added ostrich races and a race between a camel and elephant. Seriously? (Wiki said the elephant one. Probably stepped on the damn camel!)
• The first Rose Bowl football game was actually the Tournament East-West Football Game and held in 1902 and was used to generate more money and attention for the parade.
• The Rose Bowl and Stadium were created for the celebration in 1923. At that time the stadium could hold over 43,000 people! Now, it is upward of 90,000!
• Over the last 100+ years, the Rose Parade and the Rose Bowl have become America’s New Year’s Celebration with more than a million people flocking to it every year and millions more watching it on television.

Now: Floats in recent Rose Parades

The History of the Rose Bowl & the Stadium

• The games is always played on New Year’s Day, unless January 1 falls on a Sunday. Then the parade and festivities are moved to January 2.
• There are three major early events: The first ever East-West Game, The first annual Tournament of Roses football game (Rose Bowl) and the first Rose Bowl played in the Rose Bowl Stadium.
• The first Tournament East-West Football Game pitted Michigan against Stanford  on January 1, 1902
• Michigan destroyed Stanford 49-0 and because it was so lopsided, the Tournament of Roses Association decided not to bring football back to the festivities until 1916.
• The first annual Tournament of Roses Football Game was in 1916 with Washington State University and Brown University. Washington won 14-0.

• The first official Rose Bowl played in the Rose Bowl Stadium was in 1923 with the USC Trojans and the Penn State Nittany Lions
• The Rose Bowl Stadium was originally in the shape of a horseshoe. It was not expanded until 1928. It is modeled after the Yale Bowl in New Haven, Conn.
• The Stadium was host to 5 Super Bowls. It is also the current home of NCAA’s UCLA Bruins.
• The Rose Bowl is considered to be “the Grandaddy of Them All” and even has it’s own Hall of Fame. The Tournament of Roses website says:

“the game has showcased 18 Heisman Trophy Winners, produced 28 national champions, featured 189 consensus All-Americans and honored 89 college football legends by inducting them into the Rose Bowl Hall of Fame.”

• The 2009 Rose Bowl features Penn State and USC and airs at 2:10 p.m (Pacific Time.) January 1st! Happy New Year!

up next: Girl’s Guide to the Bowls Part III

go back to A Girl’s Guide to the Bowls Part I

Now, if you are looking for in depth info about College Football’s BCS, or Bowl Championship Series, check out our post A Girl’s Guide to college Football: The FBS, FCS, BCS…..OMG! WTF?

Turns out “bowl” came about because the first post-season college football games took place in the Rose Bowl Stadium. (Aha! Finally we know which came first the chicken or the egg! I mean the stadium or the playoff name.  The Rose Bowl Stadium was named for its bowl-shape design NOT because it is the host of the Rose Bowl. The tourney is named for the stadium)

aw Rose Bowl Stadium does look like a big bowl!

Great. So why did it catch on?

The Rose Bowl drew in so much revenue and tourism traffic that other towns began seeing the potential in having their own festivities, regardless if their stadiums looked like bowls. The number of bowls grew from 1 in 1930, 5 in the 40s, to 11 in the 70s and now, there is a total of 34 across the country. Originally, all the games took place on New Year’s Day as part of the town’s celebration. Also, back in the day without Southwest, JetBlue, Expedia and Priceline or even SUVs to help with the traveling, the bowls were held after the regular season to give fans the opportunity to travel to the site.

NFL Copycats

Yeah the NFL totally jumped on that bandwagon! They saw the revenue the bowls were driving in and began calling their all-star game the Pro Bowl in 1951. Apparently “all-star game” isn’t elite enough (though it works well for the MLB and NBA).  And you are going to totally love where the name Super Bowl came from! I know you are thinking it’s just because it’s the superest bowl of them all but nope, it’s even better than that! It could be the best piece of trivia I give you until next year (gosh I really hope I post this on the 31st and not the 1st or that joke just won’t be funny at all will it?)

So from Wikipedia, my favorite sports reference place, I give you the origin of the term Super Bowl:

“According to NFL Films President Steve Sabol, the NFL Comissioner Pete Rozelle wanted to call the [NFL-AFL Wold Championship Game] “The Big One.”  During the discussions to iron out the details, AFL founder Lamar Hunt had jokingly referred to the proposed interleague championship as the “Super Bowl.” Hunt thought of the name after seeing his children playing with a toy called a Super Ball; the small, round ball is now on display at the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio”

Oddly enough, I think I knew that beforehand and blocked it out.

up next: A Girl’s Guide to the Bowls Part II