History of the Liberty Bowl
The University of Mississippi is tied for the record with the most appearances in the bowl with four (with Louisville, Alabama and Air Force) but is the only team to have won all four times.
Played every December since 1959, The Liberty Bowl was played first in Philadelphia – hence the Liberty Title – but proved too cold for the (approx) 8000 fans in attendance. It was moved indoors at Convention Hall in Atlantic City, and has since moved to Memphis, calling it home since 1965. In the 80s, the winner of the commander in Chiefs Trophy received an automatic invite to play the Liberty Bowl. Since 1997, the season champ of Conference USA has served as the host team. And since the start of the 2006 College football season, the Liberty Bowl will match teams from Conference USA and the Southeastern Conference.
2006 Liberty Bowl
The 2006 Liberty Bowl took place December 29th between South Carolina (winner, 42) and Houston (36). Remember the low attendance for the first match? Well, the ’06 Liberty Bowl boasted 56,103 fans in the stadium. The tempo for the ’06 Liberty Bowl will be hard to beat – it featured 68 attempted passes, with South Carolina QB Blake Mitchell distributing the ball for 323 yards and four touchdowns. Htown showed a lot of heart as well, using amazing mobility to avoid the rush. And it was quite close – Houston threw 386 yards and had 3 touchdowns. At the end though, two turnovers by DE Jordin Lindsey proved to be the winning difference in the shootout. Tickets for ’07 will prove to be even more exciting, and we’re amped for this year!
More Liberty Bowl History
The Liberty Bowl is an annual U.S. American college football bowl game played in December of each year from 1959 to 2007. The Liberty Bowl following the 2008 regular season will be held on January 2, 2009. The Liberty Bowl was sponsored by AXA Financial and was known as the AXA Liberty Bowl from 1997 to 2003. Since 2004, the game has been sponsored by Memphis-based auto parts retailer AutoZone, and is now called the AutoZone Liberty Bowl.
The bowl game was first played in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania at John F. Kennedy Stadium (originally Municipal Stadium) until 1963. Initially, the game, the only cold-weather bowl game of its time, was plagued by poor attendance (the 1963 game drew only 8,309 spectators), so the 1964 game was the first bowl game ever played indoors in Atlantic City, New Jersey at Convention Hall before 6,059 fans.
Since 1965, the game has made its home in Memphis, Tennessee in Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium to much larger crowds and has established itself as one of the oldest non-BCS bowls. During the late 1980s and early 1990s, the Liberty Bowl offered an automatic invitation to the winner of the Commander in Chief's Trophy, if that team was bowl eligible. From 1996-2004, the regular season champion of Conference USA served as the host team. Since 2005, the winner of the C-USA Championship game has received the berth. |
