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The
Alabama Crimson Tide football
The Alabama Crimson Tide football program represents the University of Alabama (variously Alabama, UA, or Bama) in the sport of American football. The team competes in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) of the National Collegiate Athletic Asso ...
team competes as part of the
NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision
The NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), formerly known as Division I-A, is the highest level of college football in the United States. The FBS consists of the largest schools in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). As ...
(FBS), representing the
University of Alabama
The University of Alabama (informally known as Alabama, UA, or Bama) is a Public university, public research university in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Established in 1820 and opened to students in 1831, the University of Alabama is the oldest and la ...
in the Western Division of 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). Since the establishment of the team in 1892, Alabama has appeared in 75
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 ...
s.
[Bowl/All-Star Game Records, p. 14][Bowl Bound, p. 182] Included in these games are 40 combined appearances in the traditional "big four" bowl games (the
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 ...
,
Sugar
Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. Compound sugars, also called disaccharides or double ...
,
Cotton
Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus ''Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure cellulose, and can contain minor perce ...
, and
Orange
Orange most often refers to:
*Orange (fruit), the fruit of the tree species '' Citrus'' × ''sinensis''
** Orange blossom, its fragrant flower
*Orange (colour), from the color of an orange, occurs between red and yellow in the visible spectrum
* ...
), 6
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 ...
(BCS) game appearances (including three victories in the
BCS National Championship Game
The BCS National Championship Game, or BCS National Championship, was a postseason college football bowl game, used to determine a national champion of the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), first played in the 1998 college fo ...
) and six appearances in the
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 ...
, and three victories in the College Football Playoff National Championship Game.
[Bowl/All-Star Game Records, p. 31]
Alabama's first bowl game was in 1926, when
Wallace Wade
William Wallace Wade (June 15, 1892 – October 7, 1986) was an American football player and coach of football, basketball, and baseball, and college athletics administrator. He served as the head football coach at the University of Alabama fro ...
led them to the first of three Rose Bowls during his tenure and defeated
Washington
Washington commonly refers to:
* Washington (state), United States
* Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States
** A metonym for the federal government of the United States
** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...
20–19.
[Bowl Bound, p. 188] Taking over for Wade following the 1930 season, between 1931 and 1946
Frank Thomas led Alabama to six bowl appearances including three Rose, and one trip each to the Cotton, Orange and Sugar Bowls.
[Bowl Bound, pp. 189–190] After Thomas,
Harold Drew
Harold Delbert "Red" Drew (November 9, 1894 – October 20, 1979) was an American football, basketball, and track and field coach for over 40 years. He was the head coach of the Alabama Crimson Tide football team from 1947 to 1954, compiling a r ...
led Alabama to the Sugar, Orange and Cotton Bowls between 1947 and 1954.
[Bowl Bound, p. 191] After a five-year bowl absence, Alabama made the first of 24 consecutive bowl appearances under
Paul "Bear" Bryant
Paul William "Bear" Bryant (September 11, 1913 – January 26, 1983) was an American college football player and coach. He is considered by many to be one of the greatest college football coaches of all time, and best known as the head coach of t ...
in the 1959
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 ...
.
[Bowl Bound, pp. 192–199] From 1959 to 1982, Bryant led the Crimson Tide to eight Sugar, five Orange, four Cotton, four Liberty, two
Bluebonnet and one
Gator Bowl
The Gator Bowl is an annual college football bowl game held in Jacksonville, Florida, operated by Gator Bowl Sports. It has been held continuously since 1946, making it the sixth oldest college bowl, as well as the first one ever televised natio ...
s.
After Bryant retired,
Ray Perkins
Walter Ray Perkins (November 6, 1941 – December 9, 2020) was an American football coach and player. He played as a wide receiver for the University of Alabama and Baltimore Colts. He later worked as a football coach for 28 years, including sti ...
extended Alabama's consecutive bowl game streak to 25 years with a victory in the 1983
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. ...
.
[Bowl Bound, p. 200] However, the streak ended when the
1984 team finished the season with a record of five wins and six losses and failed to qualify for a bowl for the first time in 26 years.
The bowl absence lasted only one season as Perkins led the Crimson Tide to wins in both the
Aloha
''Aloha'' ( , ) is the Hawaiian language, Hawaiian word for love, affection, peace, compassion and mercy, that is commonly used as a simple greeting but has a deeper cultural and spiritual significance to native Hawaiians, for whom the term is u ...
and Sun Bowls before he resigned as head coach following the
1986 season.
Bill Curry
William Alexander Curry (born October 21, 1942) is a retired American football coach and former player.
Most recently, Curry was the head coach at Georgia State University, which began competing in college football in 2010. Previously, Curry s ...
continued the bowl tradition and led the Crimson Tide to
Hall of Fame
A hall, wall, or walk of fame is a list of individuals, achievements, or other entities, usually chosen by a group of electors, to mark their excellence or Wiktionary:fame, fame in their field. In some cases, these halls of fame consist of actu ...
, Sun and Sugar Bowl appearances in his three seasons as head coach.
[Bowl Bound, p. 201] After Curry,
Gene Stallings
Eugene Clifton Stallings Jr. (born March 2, 1935) is a retired American football player and coach. He played college football at Texas A&M University (1954–1956), where he was one of the "Junction Boys", and later served as the head coach at ...
took Alabama to the
Fiesta,
Blockbuster
Blockbuster or Block Buster may refer to:
*Blockbuster (entertainment) a term coined for an extremely successful movie, from which most other uses are derived.
Corporations
* Blockbuster (retailer), a defunct video and game rental chain
** Bl ...
, Gator,
Citrus
''Citrus'' is a genus of flowering plant, flowering trees and shrubs in the rue family, Rutaceae. Plants in the genus produce citrus fruits, including important crops such as Orange (fruit), oranges, Lemon, lemons, grapefruits, pomelos, and lim ...
and Outback Bowls.
[Bowl Bound, pp. 202–203] Stallings also led the Crimson Tide to victory in the first
Bowl Coalition
The College Football Bowl Coalition was formed through an agreement among Division I-A college football bowl games and conferences for the purpose of forcing a national championship game between the top two teams and to provide quality bowl game ...
national championship game with a 34–13 victory over
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 ...
in the Sugar Bowl.
In August 1995, as part of the penalty imposed by the NCAA for rules violations, Alabama was ruled ineligible to participate in the
1995 bowl season.
Following the retirement of Stallings,
Mike DuBose
Michael Lynn DuBose (born January 5, 1953) is an American football coach, most recently serving for Opp High School in Opp, Alabama. His most recent college coaching experience was serving as defensive line coach for the University of Memphis. Du ...
was hired as head coach.
After failing to qualify for a bowl game in
1997
File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; ''Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of t ...
, DuBose led the Crimson Tide to the inaugural
Music City Bowl
The Music City Bowl is a post-season American college football bowl game certified by the NCAA that has been played in Nashville, Tennessee, since 1998. Since 2020, it has been sponsored by TransPerfect and is officially known as the ''TransPerf ...
and Alabama's first BCS bowl berth in the Orange Bowl.
[Bowl Bound, pp. 204–205] After again failing to qualify for a bowl in
2000
File:2000 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Protests against Bush v. Gore after the 2000 United States presidential election; Heads of state meet for the Millennium Summit; The International Space Station in its infant form as seen from ...
, DuBose was fired and
Dennis Franchione
Dennis Wayne Franchione (born March 28, 1951), also known as Coach Fran, is a retired American football coach. He is the former head football coach at Texas State University, a position he held from 1990 to 1991, when the school w ...
was hired as head coach.
In his first season, Franchione led Alabama to the
Independence Bowl
The Independence Bowl is a post-season National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA)-sanctioned Division I college football bowl game that is played annually each December at Independence Stadium in Shreveport, Louisiana. The Independence Bowl ...
.
In February 2002, the NCAA found Alabama violated multiple rules, and as part of its penalty a two-year bowl ban was imposed to include both the
2002
File:2002 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 2002 Winter Olympics are held in Salt Lake City; Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother and her daughter Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon die; East Timor gains East Timor independence, indepe ...
and
2003
File:2003 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The crew of STS-107 perished when the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated during reentry into Earth's atmosphere; SARS became an epidemic in China, and was a precursor to SARS-CoV-2; A des ...
seasons.
Eligible again to compete in bowl games,
Mike Shula
Mike Shula (born June 3, 1965) is an American football coach who is the senior offensive assistant coach for the Buffalo Bills of the National Football League (NFL). A graduate of the University of Alabama, he was the school's head football coa ...
led Alabama to the Music City Bowl and a victory in the Cotton Bowl.
However, in 2009, Alabama was again found to have violated NCAA rules between 2005 and 2007 and as part of their penalty, the 2006 Cotton Bowl Classic victory was officially vacated.
In the week following the 2006
loss to Auburn, Shula was fired and
Joe Kines served as interim head coach for the Independence Bowl loss.
In January 2007,
Nick Saban
Nicholas Lou Saban Jr. (; born October 31, 1951) is an American football coach who has been the head football coach at the University of Alabama since 2007. Saban previously served as head coach of the National Football League's Miami Dolphins ...
was hired as head coach, and has led the Crimson Tide to 15 bowl appearances in his twelve seasons at Alabama.
[Bowl Bound, p. 206] After defeating
Colorado
Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...
in the Independence Bowl, Saban led Alabama to their second BCS bowl against
Utah
Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to it ...
in the Sugar Bowl.
In 2009, Saban led the Crimson Tide to the BCS National Championship Game, and defeated
Texas
Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...
37–21 to clinch the program's first national title of the BCS era.
A year after Alabama defeated
Michigan State
Michigan State University (Michigan State, MSU) is a public land-grant research university in East Lansing, Michigan. It was founded in 1855 as the Agricultural College of the State of Michigan, the first of its kind in the United States. It i ...
in the
2011 Capital One Bowl
The 2011 Capital One Bowl was the sixty-fifth edition of the college football bowl game, and was played at the Citrus Bowl in Orlando, Florida. The game was played on January 1, 2010 NCAA Division I FBS football season, 2011 and matched the Alabam ...
, the Crimson Tide defeated
LSU
Louisiana State University (officially Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College, commonly referred to as LSU) is a public land-grant research university in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The university was founded in 1860 near ...
in the
BCS National Championship Game
The BCS National Championship Game, or BCS National Championship, was a postseason college football bowl game, used to determine a national champion of the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), first played in the 1998 college fo ...
to clinch the program's second national title of the BCS era.
The following season, the Crimson Tide won their second consecutive
BCS National Championship Game
The BCS National Championship Game, or BCS National Championship, was a postseason college football bowl game, used to determine a national champion of the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), first played in the 1998 college fo ...
by a final score of 42–14 over
Notre Dame.
In their latest bowl appearance, Alabama defeated
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 ...
in 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. ...
.
The win brings Alabama's overall bowl record to 44 wins, 26 losses, and 3 ties, placing the Crimson Tide in first place among all FBS schools for both bowl appearances and victories.
Key
Bowl games
Notes
References
;General
*
*
;Specific
{{DEFAULTSORT:Alabama Crimson Tide bowl games
Alabama Crimson Tide
The Alabama Crimson Tide refers to the intercollegiate athletic varsity teams that represent the University of Alabama, located in Tuscaloosa. The Crimson Tide teams compete in the National Collegiate Athletic Association's Division I as a mem ...
*
Alabama Crimson Tide bowl games