The 1999 Rose Bowl was the 85th

Rose Bowl game The Rose Bowl Game is an annual American college football bowl game, usually played on January 1 (New Year's Day) at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. When New Year's Day falls on a Sunday, the game is played on Monday, January 2. The Rose ...

and was played on Friday January 1, 1999, at the

Rose Bowl Stadium The Rose Bowl is an outdoor athletic stadium located in Pasadena, California. Opened in October 1922, the stadium is recognized as a National Historic Landmark and a California Historic Civil Engineering landmark. At a modern capacity of an all-s ...

Pasadena, California Pasadena ( ) is a city in Los Angeles County, California, northeast of downtown Los Angeles. It is the most populous city and the primary cultural center of the San Gabriel Valley. Old Pasadena is the city's original commercial district. I ...

. It was a

college football College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States. Unlike most ...

bowl game In North America, a bowl game is one of a number of post-season college football games that are primarily played by teams belonging to the NCAA's Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). For most of its history, the Division I Bowl Subdivis ...

at the end of the

1998 NCAA Division I-A football season The 1998 NCAA Division I-A football season, play of college football in the United States organized by the National Collegiate Athletic Association at the Division I-A level, began in late summer 1998 and culminated with the major bowl games in e ...

Wisconsin Wisconsin () is a state in the upper Midwestern United States. Wisconsin is the 25th-largest state by total area and the 20th-most populous. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake M ...

defeated

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California St ...

by a score of 38–31.

Ron Dayne Ronald Dayne (born March 14, 1978) is a former professional American football running back who played in the National Football League (NFL) for eight seasons. Dayne played college football for the Wisconsin Badgers football, University of Wisco ...

of Wisconsin was named the Rose Bowl Player of the Game.2008 Rose Bowl Program
,

2008 Rose Bowl The 2008 Rose Bowl Game presented by Citi, the 94th Rose Bowl Game, played on January 1, 2008 at the Rose Bowl Stadium in Pasadena, California, was a college football bowl game. The contest was televised on ABC, the 20th straight year the network ...

. Accessed January 26, 2008. He tied a modern Rose Bowl record with four touchdowns. This was the first year that the Rose Bowl became part of the

Bowl Championship Series The Bowl Championship Series (BCS) was a selection system that created four or five bowl game match-ups involving eight or ten of the top ranked teams in the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) of American college football, including ...

, ending a long-standing agreement between the

Big Ten The Big Ten Conference (stylized B1G, formerly the Western Conference and the Big Nine Conference) is the oldest Division I collegiate athletic conference in the United States. Founded as the Intercollegiate Conference of Faculty Representati ...

and the "West Representative" (

PCC PCC may refer to: Science and technology * Pearson correlation coefficient (''r''), in statistics * Periodic counter-current chromatography, a type of affinity chromatography * Portable C Compiler, an early compiler for the C programming language ...

AAWU The Pac-12 Conference is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference, that operates in the Western United States, participating in 24 sports at the NCAA Division I level. Its College football, football teams compete in the NCAA D ...

) and the first year that the game was branded with corporate sponsorship. Unlike the other bowl games, the sponsor was not added to the title of the game, but instead as a presenter, so it became known as The Rose Bowl Game presented by

AT&T AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the world's largest telecommunications company by revenue and the third largest provider of mobile tel ...

Bowl Championship Series

The Bowl Coalition was restructured into the

Bowl Alliance The Bowl Alliance was an agreement among college football bowl games (specifically the Sugar, Orange, and Fiesta Bowls) for the purpose of trying to match the top two teams in a national championship game and to provide quality bowl game matchups ...

for the 1995 season, involving five conferences (reduced to four for the 1996 season) and three bowls. The championship game rotated among the three bowls. However, it still didn't include the Pac-10 or Big Ten champs.

Michigan Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and the ...

and

Nebraska Nebraska () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by South Dakota to the north; Iowa to the east and Missouri to the southeast, both across the Missouri River; Kansas to the south; Colorado to the southwe ...

split the National Championship during the 1997 season after never having met on the field. After a protracted round of negotiations, the Bowl Alliance was reconfigured into the

for the 1998 season. The

Pasadena Tournament of Roses The Rose Parade, also known as the Tournament of Roses Parade (or simply the Tournament of Roses), is an annual parade held mostly along Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena, California, Pasadena, California, United States, on New Year's Day (or on Mon ...

, which operates the

Rose Bowl Game The Rose Bowl Game is an annual American college football bowl game, usually played on January 1 (New Year's Day) at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. When New Year's Day falls on a Sunday, the game is played on Monday, January 2. The Rose ...

, agreed to release the

Pac-10 The Pac-12 Conference is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference, that operates in the Western United States, participating in 24 sports at the NCAA Division I level. Its College football, football teams compete in the NCAA D ...

champions if necessary to facilitate a national championship game. In return, the Rose Bowl was added to the yearly national championship game rotation.

Teams

UCLA Bruins

Beginning in November, the Bruins were ranked number 2 behind

Tennessee Tennessee ( , ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked state in the Southeastern region of the United States. Tennessee is the 36th-largest by area and the 15th-most populous of the 50 states. It is bordered by Kentucky to th ...

. It appeared that they would face the Volunteers in the BCS championship. The UCLA Bruins went undefeated through the 1998 football season until their final game. In late September,

Miami Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a East Coast of the United States, coastal metropolis and the County seat, county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade C ...

had been forced to postpone their game with

due to

Hurricane Georges Hurricane Georges () was a powerful and long-lived Cape Verde Category 4 hurricane which caused severe destruction as it traversed the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico in September 1998, making eight landfalls along its path. Georges was the sevent ...

. The game was rescheduled for December 5 and for the #2-ranked Bruins, a trip to the National Championship game was at stake. The Hurricanes put up over 600 yards of total offense and the result was a stunning 49–45 Miami victory. Instead of advancing to the first Bowl Championship series game (the

1999 Fiesta Bowl The 1999 Fiesta Bowl, the designated BCS National Championship Game for the 1998 season, was played on January 4, 1999, in Tempe, Arizona at Sun Devil Stadium. The teams were the Tennessee Volunteers and Florida State Seminoles. Tennessee entere ...

) as a contender for the national championship, the Bruins "settled" for the Rose Bowl, something that previously had been the ultimate goal of the Pacific-10 conference champion.

Wisconsin Badgers

ended up in a three-way tie for first place in the Big Ten with

and

Ohio State The Ohio State University, commonly called Ohio State or OSU, is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. A member of the University System of Ohio, it has been ranked by major institutional rankings among the best public ...

. All three teams had 7–1 conference records and were conference co-champions. Michigan had defeated Wisconsin 27–10 in " The Big House". Wisconsin and Ohio State did not meet. At the time, the Big Ten awarded the Rose Bowl invitation to the tied team which had gone the longest period of time without an invitation: Michigan had been in the

1998 Rose Bowl The 1998 Rose Bowl was a college football bowl game, part of the 1997–98 college bowl season, played on January 1 at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. The 84th Rose Bowl Game, it featured top-ranked Michigan beating Washington State 21� ...

, Ohio State had been in the

1997 Rose Bowl The 1997 Rose Bowl was a postseason college football bowl game between the Arizona State Sun Devils of the Pacific-10 Conference and the Ohio State Buckeyes of the Big Ten Conference. The game was the 83rd edition of the annual Rose Bowl Game, held ...

, while Wisconsin had last been in the

1994 Rose Bowl The 1994 Rose Bowl was a college football bowl game played on January 1, 1994. It was the 80th Rose Bowl Game. The Wisconsin Badgers defeated the UCLA Bruins 21–16. Running back Brent Moss of Wisconsin was named the Rose Bowl Player of the Gam ...

. The circumstances of this selection and the fact that UCLA had so recently fallen from the lofty #2 in the nation status led many to deride and seriously underestimate the Badgers; most notably,

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...

analyst Craig James with his infamous declaration that Wisconsin was "the worst team to ever play in the Rose Bowl".

Game summary

The weather was sunny and 74 degrees and the crowd of 93,872 at the Rose Bowl was described by one reporter as a "sea of red ��with a few small breaks of Bruin blue." In the first half, both teams scored three touchdowns, with UCLA answering each of the first two Wisconsin scores and then taking its only lead of the game (21–14) in the second quarter. After re-tying the game, Wisconsin would add a field goal to account for the halftime score of 24–21. All six touchdowns had come on lengthy drives, with UCLA's best starting position being its own 35-yard line and Wisconsin's its own 25. The Badgers' scoring plays were emblematic of their style of play: Relying heavily on the run (running the ball 48 times in the game as opposed to just 17 passing attempts),"Team Statistics"
Retrieved January 4, 2021. they scored three times on rushes by

, including a 54-yard run for the first touchdown of the game. UCLA on the other hand, scored its three first-half touchdowns on passing plays, including one thrown by wide receiver

Freddie Mitchell Freddie Lee Mitchell II (born November 28, 1978) is a former American football wide receiver who played for the Philadelphia Eagles of the National Football League (NFL) for four seasons. He was chosen as a consensus All-American in 2000 whi ...

on a trick play. On the opening drive of the second half, Wisconsin continued the scoring trend, going ahead 31–21 on Ron Dayne's fourth touchdown run of the game. This would, however, turn out to be the last offensive score by the Badgers. UCLA would then sustain two long drives of its own. However, the Bruins lost the ball on a fumble on the Wisconsin 6-yard line before scoring a touchdown on their next drive on a 10-yard run by Jermaine Lewis to cut the Wisconsin lead to 31–28. The eventual "clinching" play occurred on UCLA's next drive, at the start of the fourth quarter, when

Cade McNown Cade Brem McNown (born January 12, 1977) is an American former football quarterback who played in the National Football League (NFL) for four seasons, most notably with the Chicago Bears. He played college football at UCLA, where he won the ...

threw an interception to

Jamar Fletcher Jamar Mondell Israel (born August 28, 1979), born Jamar Mondell Fletcher, is an American former college and professional football player who was a cornerback in the National Football League (NFL) for eight seasons in the early 2000s. He played ...

, which was returned 47 yards for a Wisconsin touchdown to extend the Badgers' lead to 38–28. On its next possession, UCLA came up short on a fake punt, but subsequently regained possession after a Wisconsin fumble on a bad snap. Starting from the Wisconsin 33, the Bruins went deep on their first play, which resulted in Jamar Fletcher being called for pass interference on

Danny Farmer Daniel Steven Farmer (born May 21, 1977) is a former American football wide receiver who played in the National Football League (NFL) and at UCLA. In 2000, he was drafted in the fourth round (103rd overall pick) by the Pittsburgh Steelers. Aft ...

in the endzone. However, UCLA had to settle for a field goal to make the score 38–31 Wisconsin with 6:05 left in the game. On their last possession, the Bruins allowed a "sack of McNown on fourth-and-3 at the Wisconsin 47-yard line with 59 seconds remaining."Gurnick, Ken
"College Football: Rose Bowl; Badgers Prove Doubters Wrong"
''New York Times'', January 2, 1999. Retrieved January 4, 2021. This sealed the victory for the Badgers, who won despite being outgained 538–497 in terms of offensive yards and not scoring an offensive touchdown for the last 26 1/2 minutes of the game.

Scoring summary

First quarter

*Wisconsin –

, 54-yard run. Matt Davenport converts. 3:50. 7–0 UW *UCLA – Jermaine Lewis, 38-yard pass from

. Chris Sailer converts. 0:57. 7–7

Second quarter

*Wisconsin – Dayne, seven-yard run. Davenport converts. 10:58. 14–7 UW *UCLA –

Durell Price Durell Price was a football player for the UCLA Bruins and Sylmar High School Spartans between 1993 and 1999. Despite being highly regarded out of college, he was never drafted and did not make it to the NFL except for a short stint with the S ...

, 61-yard pass from

. Sailer converts. 10:08. 14–14 *UCLA –

, 41-yard pass from McNown. Sailer converts. 5:15. 21–14 UCLA *Wisconsin – Dayne, 10-yard run. Davenport converts. 3:00. 21–21 *Wisconsin – Davenport, 40-yard field goal. 0:17. 24–21 UW

Third quarter

*Wisconsin – Dayne, 22-yard run. Davenport converts. 11:28. 31–21 UW *UCLA – Lewis, 10-yard run. Sailer converts. 4:06. 31–28 UW

Fourth quarter

*Wisconsin –

, 46-yard interception return. Davenport converts. 14:08. 38–28 UW *UCLA — Sailer, 30-yard field goal 6:05. 38–31 UW

Statistics

Game notes

* Several Rose Bowl records were equaled or broken. The UCLA Bruins set the single-team Rose Bowl record for total yards. In his final college game,

, the UCLA quarterback, passed for 340 yards, the fourth-highest total in bowl history, and UCLA finished with 538 yards, 418 in the air. *Wisconsin running back

tied the modern Rose Bowl record of four touchdowns along with Eric Ball from the

1986 Rose Bowl The 1986 Rose Bowl was a college football bowl game played on January 1, 1986. It was the 72nd edition and was held at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. The UCLA Bruins upset the Iowa Hawkeyes 45–28. UCLA tailback Eric Ball was named t ...

and

Sam Cunningham Samuel Lewis Cunningham Jr (August 15, 1950 – September 7, 2021), nicknamed "Bam", was an American football fullback who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 10 seasons with the New England Patriots. He played college football at ...

from the

1973 Rose Bowl The 1973 Rose Bowl was the 59th edition of the college football bowl game, played at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, on Monday, January 1. It matched the undefeated and top-ranked USC Trojans of the Pacific-8 Conference with the # ...

. * Ron Dayne rushed for 246 yards, one short of the Rose Bowl Game record set by USC’s Charles White in 1980. * The teams would break an older record of 931 combined yards of offense, combining for 1,035 total yards.

Aftermath

Rose Bowl records

Eight Rose Bowl records were set or tied in the game. With his four touchdowns, Ron Dayne tied three modern Rose Bowl touchdown records: most touchdowns, most rushing touchdowns and most career rushing touchdowns. With 24 points, he also tied most points in game and career. These records are shared along with Eric Ball from the

and

from the

Vince Young Vincent Paul Young Jr. (born May 18, 1983) is a former American football quarterback who played in the National Football League (NFL) for six seasons. Young was drafted by the Tennessee Titans as the third overall pick in the 2006 NFL Draft, and ...

would also join this group following the

2006 Rose Bowl The 2006 Rose Bowl Game, played on January 4, 2006 at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, was an American college football bowl game that served as the BCS National Championship Game for the 2005 NCAA Division I-A football season. It featured ...

, and the records still stand as of the

2015 Rose Bowl The 2015 Rose Bowl (officially known as the College Football Playoff Semifinal at the Rose Bowl Game presented by Northwestern Mutual) was a college football bowl game played on January 1, 2015, at the Rose Bowl stadium in Pasadena, California. Th ...

. Dayne was named the Rose Bowl

MVP In team sports, a most valuable player award, abbreviated 'MVP award', is an honor typically bestowed upon an individual (or individuals, in the instance of a tie) whose individual performance is the greatest in an entire league, for a particu ...

for 1999 and would repeat this feat in the

2000 Rose Bowl The 2000 Rose Bowl was a college football bowl game played on January 1, 2000. It was the 86th Rose Bowl game The Rose Bowl Game is an annual American college football bowl game, usually played on January 1 (New Year's Day) at the Rose Bowl in ...

, becoming one of only three (now, four) players to ever repeat as a Rose Bowl MVP (and the only player from the

Big Ten Conference The Big Ten Conference (stylized B1G, formerly the Western Conference and the Big Nine Conference) is the oldest Division I collegiate athletic conference in the United States. Founded as the Intercollegiate Conference of Faculty Representati ...

). For the teams, the following records were broken, but no longer stand. *Total offense: UCLA, 538 yards (old record: 519 by Southern California vs. Ohio State in the

1980 Rose Bowl The 1980 Rose Bowl was It was the 66th edition of the college football bowl game, played on Tuesday, January 1, at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. The USC Trojans, champions of the Pacific-10 Conference, defeated the Ohio State Buckeyes, ...

, surpassed by 574 yards for USC in the

). *Total offense, two teams: UCLA and Wisconsin, 1,035 yards (old record: 931 yards by Oregon and Penn State in the

1995 Rose Bowl The 1995 Rose Bowl was a college football bowl game played on Monday January 2, 1995, because New Year's Day was on a Sunday. It was the 81st Rose Bowl Game. The Penn State Nittany Lions defeated the Oregon Ducks 38–20. Ki-Jana Carter of Pe ...

and Southern California and Ohio State in the

, surpassed by USC and Texas with 1,130 yards in the

). *Most yards per play: 7.6, Wisconsin (old record: 7.5 by Iowa vs. California in the

1959 Rose Bowl The 1959 Rose Bowl was the 45th edition of the college football bowl game, played at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, on Thursday, January 1. The heavily-favored and second-ranked Iowa Hawkeyes of the Big Ten Conference defeated the #16 Cal ...

, surpassed by Miami at 7.74 in the

2002 Rose Bowl The 2002 Rose Bowl, played on January 3, 2002, was a college football bowl game. It was the 88th Rose Bowl game and was the BCS National Championship Game of the 2001 college football season. The game featured the Miami Hurricanes and the Nebra ...

). *Most points in one half, two teams (tie): 45; Wisconsin 24, UCLA 21 (ties Southern California 35, Ohio State 10 in the

, surpassed by USC and Texas with 53 points in the second half of the

References

{{Wisconsin Badgers bowl game navbox Rose Bowl Rose Bowl Game UCLA Bruins football bowl games Wisconsin Badgers football bowl games January 1999 sports events in the United States

Rose A rose is either a woody perennial flowering plant of the genus ''Rosa'' (), in the family Rosaceae (), or the flower it bears. There are over three hundred species and tens of thousands of cultivars. They form a group of plants that can be ...