The 2018 Sun Bowl 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 that was played on Monday, December 31, 2018. It was the 85th edition of the

Sun Bowl The Sun Bowl is a college football bowl game that has been played since 1935 in the southwestern United States at El Paso, Texas. Along with the Sugar Bowl and Orange Bowl, it is the second-oldest bowl game in the country, behind the Rose Bowl. ...

, and was one of the 2018–19 bowl games concluding the 2018 FBS football season. Sponsored by Hyundai Motor America, the game was officially known as the Hyundai Sun Bowl.

Teams

The game featured

Stanford Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is considere ...

of the

Pac-12 Conference 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 Pittsburgh of the

Atlantic Coast Conference The Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) is a collegiate athletic conference located in the eastern United States. Headquartered in Greensboro, North Carolina, the ACC's fifteen member universities compete in the National Collegiate Athletic Associa ...

(ACC). The two programs have previously met three times, most recently in 1932, with Pittsburgh holding a 2–1 series lead. The referee for the game, David Smith of the Southeastern Conference (SEC), was the quarterback and MVP for Alabama in the

1988 Sun Bowl The 1988 John Hancock Sun Bowl, part of the 1988 bowl game season, took place on December 24, 1988, at the Sun Bowl Stadium in El Paso, Texas. The competing teams were the Alabama Crimson Tide, representing the Southeastern Conference (SEC), and ...

Stanford Cardinal

Stanford started off the season with four straight wins, including a victory over rival

USC USC most often refers to: * University of South Carolina, a public research university ** University of South Carolina System, the main university and its satellite campuses **South Carolina Gamecocks, the school athletic program * University of ...

, and they rose in the polls from No. 13 to No. 7 by the time they met Notre Dame on September 29. They lost, 38–17, which dropped them to No. 14. This began a stretch where in five games they suffered four losses, to Notre Dame, Utah, Washington State and Washington, which dropped them out of the polls and serious contention for the North Division title in the Pac-12. Stanford finished with three straight wins to end their regular season with eight victories. This was the ninth consecutive season of bowl eligibility for the Cardinal, and it was their first Sun Bowl invite since the 2016 edition.

Pittsburgh Panthers

Pittsburgh started their season with four losses in their first seven games, losing to ranked opponents such as

Penn State #Redirect Pennsylvania State University The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State or PSU) is a Public university, public Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related Land-grant university, land-grant research university with campu ...

UCF The University of Central Florida (UCF) is a public research university whose main campus is in unincorporated Orange County, Florida. UCF also has nine smaller regional campuses throughout central Florida. It is part of the State University ...

, and Notre Dame. However, the Panthers pulled off a four-game winning streak, including victories over teams such as No. 23 Virginia before closing out their regular season with a loss to Miami. Pittsburgh's 6–2 conference record was good enough for first in the Coastal Division in the ACC, earning them a birth in the

ACC Championship Game The ACC Championship Game is an annual American college football game held in early December by the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) each year to determine its football champion. From its inception in 2005 to 2022, the game pit the champion of ...

against No. 2 Clemson, where they were soundly defeated, 42–10. This was the Panthers' first Sun Bowl appearance since the 2008 edition, and tenth bowl appearance in the past eleven seasons.

Game summary

Scoring summary

Statistics

References

External links

*
Box score
at ESPN {{Stanford Cardinal bowl game navbox

Sun Bowl

2018 File:2018 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2018 Winter Olympics opening ceremony in PyeongChang, South Korea; Protests erupt following the Assassination of Jamal Khashoggi; March for Our Lives protests take place across the United ...