Poinsettia Bowl - History

History

The original incarnation of the Poinsettia Bowl was as the military services championship game, pitting the Western and Eastern Military Services champions against each other. In the inaugural Poinsettia Bowl, Bolling Air Force Base defeated the San Diego Naval Training Center by a score of 35-14 on December 20, 1952. The game was held at Balboa Stadium in San Diego in a torrential downpour, before hundreds of reluctant sailors (including Hayden Fry) who were ordered to sit in the stands so that they wouldn't appear empty in the nationally televised game. Television came to terms with the NCAA the next year, making the 1952 Poinsettia Bowl the last nationally televised game between military teams other than the annual Army-Navy game. In the 1953 Poinsettia Bowl, the Quantico Marines team led by Fry lost to the Army team, the Fort Ord Warriors, a team that featured quarterback Don Heinrich and running back Ollie Matson. Fort Ord repeated as champion in 1955, the year of the fourth and final such Poinsettia Bowl.

The bowl was resurrected in the 21st century. In the week leading up to the 2005 Poinsettia Bowl, the United States Naval Academy Midshipmen accepted an invitation to the 2008 (however, they played in the EagleBank Bowl instead), 2009, or 2010 Poinsettia Bowls if Navy was bowl eligible in those seasons. The fact that there are several naval bases in and around San Diego contributed to this decision by the independent Midshipmen.

The inaugural 2005 Poinsettia Bowl game matched Navy Midshipmen against the Colorado State Rams; Navy won 51–30. It had attendance of 36,842.

The Poinsettia Bowl announced that if the Army Black Knights became bowl-eligible by the end of the 2006 regular season, they would win an automatic birth in their bowl game; however, The Cadets wound up with a losing record, and were not invited.

In July 2007, it was announced that (starting with the 2008 game) the Pac-10 would send its seventh-place team to the game, and its sixth-place team in 2009 and 2010 -- replacing the at-large team.

The 2007 game matched the Utah Utes against the Navy Midshipmen; Utah won, 35–32. Navy made the Poinsettia Bowl as a result of Navy's win over North Texas, a game that set a new NCAA record for most points scored in a college football game. That year's attendance was 39,129.

It was announced, starting with the 2008 season, and continuing through 2009, if the Pac-10 does not have enough bowl-eligible teams to send one to the Poinsettia Bowl (a contractual obligation), the game's organizers reserved the right to select a WAC team to take the Pac-10 team's place (if available).

The 2008 game matched the #11 TCU Horned Frogs of the Mountain West Conference against the #9 Boise State Broncos the Western Athletic Conference champion; TCU won, 17–16. Boise State replaced the representative from the Pac-10, since it did not an extra bowl-eligible teams to spare for this game. The game garnered a 3.74 national television rating on ESPN, the bowl’s most watched game ever and the highest rated pre-Christmas game ever on the all-sports network.

The 2009 game matched the #23 Utah Utes against the California Golden Bears; Utah won, 37-27.

The 2010 game matched the San Diego State Aztecs against the Navy Midshipmen. San Diego State won 35-14. That year's attendance was 48,049.

Louisiana Tech and TCU received and accepted bids to participate in the 2011 Poinsettia Bowl, which TCU won 31-24. TCU's participation was somewhat unexpected as they missed out on a second straight BCS Bowl by a single national rank position, ranked 17th in the nation. Had they been ranked 16 they would have automatically qualified for their second straight BCS Bowl appearance following their 21-19 victory over the Big 10 Champion Wisconsin Badgers.