The 2021 Liberty Bowl was a

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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 ...

played on December 28, 2021, with kickoff at 6:45 p.m. EST (5:45 p.m. local CST) and televised on

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 ...

. It was the 63rd edition of the

Liberty Bowl The Liberty Bowl is an annual American college football bowl game played in late December or early January since 1959. For its first five years, it was played at Philadelphia Municipal Stadium in Philadelphia before being held at Atlantic City ...

, and was one of the 2021–22 bowl games concluding the 2021 FBS football season. Sponsored by automotive retailer AutoZone, the game was officially known as the AutoZone Liberty Bowl.

Teams

Consistent with conference tie-ins, the game was played between teams from the

Southeastern Conference The Southeastern Conference (SEC) is an American college athletic conference whose member institutions are located primarily in the South Central and Southeastern United States. Its fourteen members include the flagship public universities of ...

(SEC) and the

Big 12 Conference The Big 12 Conference is a college athletic conference headquartered in Irving, Texas, USA. It consists of ten full-member universities. It is a member of Division I of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) for all sports. Its ...

. This was the eighth meeting between Mississippi State and Texas Tech, with the most recent prior meeting coming in 1970; the Bulldogs led the all-time series, 4–2–1.

Mississippi State Bulldogs

Mississippi State, from the SEC, finished the regular season with an overall record of 7–5. This was the Bulldogs' third Liberty Bowl appearance, having appeared in the

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and

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editions, winning both. In 2007, Mississippi State defeated

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 ...

, 10–3. In the 2013 game, the Bulldogs defeated

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, 44–7. Mississippi State head coach Mike Leach was the head coach at Texas Tech from 2000 to 2009.

Texas Tech Red Raiders

Texas Tech, from the Big 12, finished the regular season with an overall record of 6–6. This was the Red Raiders' first Liberty Bowl appearance. The team was led by interim head coach Sonny Cumbie, who was the starting quarterback at Texas Tech during the 2004 season, playing for Leach.

Game summary

Statistics

References

Externals links

Game statistics
at statbroadcast.com {{Texas Tech Red Raiders bowl game navbox

Liberty Bowl Mississippi State Bulldogs football bowl games Texas Tech Red Raiders football bowl games