The 2021 Rose Bowl (branded as the College Football Playoff Semifinal at the Rose Bowl Game presented by

Capital One Capital One Financial Corporation is an American bank holding company specializing in credit cards, auto loans, banking, and savings accounts, headquartered in McLean, Virginia with operations primarily in the United States. It is on the list o ...

for sponsorship reasons) 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 ...

played on January 1, 2021, with kickoff at 3:00 p.m. CST at

AT&T Stadium AT&T Stadium, formerly Cowboys Stadium, is a retractable roof, retractable-roof stadium in Arlington, Texas, United States. It serves as the home of the Dallas Cowboys of the National Football League (NFL), and was completed on May 27, 2009. I ...

Arlington, Texas Arlington is a city in the U.S. state of Texas, located in Tarrant County. It forms part of the Mid-Cities region of the Dallas–Fort Worth–Arlington metropolitan statistical area, and is a principal city of the metropolis and region. ...

. The 107th playing of 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 ...

, it was one of two

College Football Playoff The College Football Playoff (CFP) is an annual postseason knockout invitational tournament to determine a national champion for the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), the highest level ...

(CFP) semifinal games; its winner faced the winner of the

Sugar Bowl The Sugar Bowl is an annual American college football bowl game played in New Orleans, Louisiana. Played annually since January 1, 1935, it is tied with the Orange Bowl and Sun Bowl as the second-oldest bowl games in the country, surpassed onl ...

at the

2021 College Football Playoff National Championship The 2021 College Football Playoff National Championship was a college football bowl game played to determine a national champion in the National Collegiate Athletic Association's Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) for the 2020 season. ...

. It was also one of the 2020–21 bowl games concluding the 2020 FBS football season. It was the first playing of the Rose Bowl outside of

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 ...

, since

1942 Events Below, the events of World War II have the "WWII" prefix. January * January 1 – WWII: The Declaration by United Nations is signed by China, the United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union, and 22 other nations, in wh ...

, in a move prompted by the

COVID-19 pandemic in California Ten of the first twenty confirmed COVID-19 cases in the United States occurred in California, the first of which was confirmed on January 26, 2020. All of the early confirmed cases were persons who had recently travelled to China, as testing wa ...

Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic

The game was originally scheduled to be played 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 ...

. In early December 2020, it was announced that the bowl would be contested behind closed doors without fans, due to

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Gavin Newsom Gavin Christopher Newsom (born October 10, 1967) is an American politician and businessman who has been the 40th governor of California since 2019. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the 49th lieutenant governor of California fr ...

's orders in response to the

. Organizers attempted to negotiate an exemption to the health orders—which prohibit any spectators at a sporting event—in order to allow the family members of participating players to attend. However, they were denied. On December 15, the ''Los Angeles Times'' reported that "serious considerations" were being made to re-locate the game due to the state of the pandemic in California, with major surges in new cases, and ICU capacity in Southern California declared to be 0% as of December 17. On December 19, 2020, the

Pasadena Tournament of Roses Association Pasadena Tournament of Roses Association, created by the efforts of Charles Frederick Holder and Francis F. Rowland, is the non-profit organization that has annually produced the New Year's Day Rose Parade since 1890 and the Rose Bowl since 190 ...

announced that the game would be relocated to

. The only prior time the Rose Bowl was played outside of Pasadena was in

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

; after large gatherings were prohibited on the west coast due to fears of a Japanese attack following the

attack on Pearl Harbor The attack on Pearl HarborAlso known as the Battle of Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service upon the United States against the naval base at Pearl Harbor in Honolulu, Territory of Hawaii, j ...

in December 1941, the game was re-located to

Duke Stadium Wallace Wade Stadium, in full Brooks Field at Wallace Wade Stadium, is a 40,004-seat outdoor stadium in the southeastern United States, located on the campus of Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. Primarily used for American football, it is ...

Durham, North Carolina Durham ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina and the county seat of Durham County, North Carolina, Durham County. Small portions of the city limits extend into Orange County, North Carolina, Orange County and Wake County, North Carol ...

. The Association stated that it was not immediately clear if the game would still be called the "Rose Bowl", as consent would also have to be obtained from the city of Pasadena, due to a master license agreement covering use of the name (which is co-owned by the Tournament of Roses Association and Pasadena's municipal government). A later press release from the Association referred to the game as the ''College Football Playoff Semifinal presented by Capital One'', pending a decision on usage of the Rose Bowl name. A formal decision was scheduled to be discussed by city officials in Pasadena on December 22. On December 30, the City of Pasadena approved use of the Rose Bowl name for the game in Arlington, reportedly after receiving $2 million from the Tournament of Roses “to assist the city with its expenses and lost revenue”.

College Football Playoff

Teams

Teams for the game were selected by the College Football Playoff selection committee and announced on December 20, 2020. The game matched top-ranked

Alabama (We dare defend our rights) , anthem = "Alabama (state song), Alabama" , image_map = Alabama in United States.svg , seat = Montgomery, Alabama, Montgomery , LargestCity = Huntsville, Alabama, Huntsville , LargestCounty = Baldwin County, Al ...

and fourth-ranked Notre Dame. In seven prior meetings, Notre Dame held a 5–2 edge; the programs had most recently played in the

2013 BCS National Championship Game The 2013 Discover BCS National Championship Game was a postseason college football bowl game that took place on Monday, January 7, 2013, at Sun Life Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida. It featured the No. 1 ranked Notre Dame Fighting Irish and No ...

, which Alabama won by a score of 42–14.

Alabama Crimson Tide

Alabama entered the bowl with an 11–0 record, having won all 10 of their

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) regular season games, followed by a win over

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

in the

SEC Championship Game The SEC Championship Game is an annual American football game that has determined the Southeastern Conference's season champion since 1992. The championship game pits the SEC East Division regular season champion against the West Division regula ...

. The Crimson Tide had last appeared in a CFP semifinal game following the 2018 season, when they defeated

Oklahoma Oklahoma (; Choctaw language, Choctaw: ; chr, ᎣᎧᎳᎰᎹ, ''Okalahoma'' ) is a U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States, bordered by Texas on the south and west, Kansas on the nor ...

in the

Orange Bowl The Orange Bowl is an annual American college football bowl game played in the Miami metropolitan area. It has been played annually since January 1, 1935, making it, along with the Sugar Bowl and the Sun Bowl, the second-oldest bowl game in th ...

. Alabama had previously appeared in six Rose Bowl games, most recently in 1946, with a record of 4–1–1.

Notre Dame Fighting Irish

Notre Dame entered the bowl with a 10–1 record. The Fighting Irish, who traditionally compete in football as an

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

, played the 2020 season as a member 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). Notre Dame defeated nine ACC teams and one non-conference program (

South Florida South Florida is the southernmost region of the U.S. state of Florida. It is one of Florida's three most commonly referred to directional regions; the other two are Central Florida and North Florida. South Florida is the southernmost part of th ...

) during the regular season, then lost to Clemson 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 ...

. The Fighting Irish had last appeared in a CFP semifinal game following the 2018 season, when they lost to Clemson in the Cotton Bowl. The only prior appearance by Notre Dame in the Rose Bowl had been a victory over

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 ...

in the 1925 edition.

Game summary

Statistics

References

External links

*
Game statistics
at statbroadcast.com {{Notre Dame Fighting Irish bowl game navbox Rose Bowl Rose Bowl Rose Bowl Game Alabama Crimson Tide football bowl games Notre Dame Fighting Irish football bowl games Rose Bowl Rose Bowl Rose Bowl