The Little Caesars Pizza Bowl (known as the Motor City Bowl until 2009) was a post-season
college football 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 Subdivi ...
that was played annually from 1997 to 2013. The first five games (1997–2001) were played at the
Pontiac Silverdome
The Pontiac Silverdome (also known simply as the Silverdome) was a stadium in Pontiac, Michigan. It opened in 1975 and sat on 199 acres (51 ha) of land. When the stadium opened, it featured a fiberglass fabric roof held up by air pressure, ...
in
Pontiac, Michigan, and moved to the 65,000-seat
Ford Field in downtown
Detroit, Michigan
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at ...
in 2002—the past and present homes of the
Detroit Lions respectively. The game marked the first bowl game held in the Detroit area since the
Cherry Bowl
The Cherry Bowl was an annual post-season college football bowl game played in the Pontiac Silverdome in Pontiac, Michigan, in 1984 and 1985.Foldesy, Jody. "Bowls burgeon as big business", ''The Washington Times''. December 21, 1997. Page A1. Th ...
in 1984–85.
The Little Caesars Pizza Bowl featured a bowl-eligible team from the
Mid-American Conference
The Mid-American Conference (MAC) is a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) NCAA Division I, Division I collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference with a membership base in the Great Lakes region (North America), Great L ...
(usually the winner of the
MAC Championship Game
The MAC Football Championship Game is a football game between the winners of the East and West divisions of the Mid-American Conference (MAC) to determine the conference champion.
History
The game has been played since 1997, when the conferenc ...
, although that team was not required to accept the bid; prior to the formation of the bowl the MAC champion earned an automatic bid to the
Las Vegas Bowl
The Las Vegas Bowl is an NCAA Division I FBS annual post-season college football bowl game held in the Las Vegas area. First played in 1992, the bowl was originally held at the 40,000-seat Sam Boyd Stadium in Whitney, Nevada before moving to the ...
) playing a bowl-eligible team 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 ...
. If the Big Ten did not have an eligible team, the game featured a team from the
Sun Belt Conference that met the NCAA requirement of at least six wins. In the event that the Sun Belt did not have an available team, an at-large team could be chosen.
The final Little Caesars Pizza Bowl was held in 2013; it was displaced by the
Quick Lane Bowl
The Quick Lane Bowl is a post-season college football bowl game certified by the NCAA that began play in the 2014 season. Backed by the Detroit Lions of the National Football League, the game features a bowl-eligible team from the Big Ten Confe ...
, which is organized by the
Detroit Lions and also features Big Ten and MAC opponents (though the
ACC served as the Big Ten's opponent through
2019
File:2019 collage v1.png, From top left, clockwise: Hong Kong protests turn to widespread riots and civil disobedience; House of Representatives votes to adopt articles of impeachment against Donald Trump; CRISPR gene editing first used to experim ...
). Organizers explored the possibility of moving the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl to nearby
Comerica Park
Comerica Park is a baseball stadium located in Downtown Detroit. It has been the home of Major League Baseball's Detroit Tigers since 2000, when the team left Tiger Stadium.
History Construction
Founded in 1894, the Tigers had played at the c ...
as an outdoor game, but the game would instead be cancelled.
History
The Motor City Bowl started in 1997 at the
Pontiac Silverdome
The Pontiac Silverdome (also known simply as the Silverdome) was a stadium in Pontiac, Michigan. It opened in 1975 and sat on 199 acres (51 ha) of land. When the stadium opened, it featured a fiberglass fabric roof held up by air pressure, ...
.
The game was jointly sponsored by the "Big Three" automakers in Detroit from 1998 to 2007 (
Ford
Ford commonly refers to:
* Ford Motor Company, an automobile manufacturer founded by Henry Ford
* Ford (crossing), a shallow crossing on a river
Ford may also refer to:
Ford Motor Company
* Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company
* Ford F ...
,
General Motors and
Chrysler). Starting with the 2008 game, Chrysler was replaced by the Michigan Regional Council of Carpenters and Millwrights as a presenting sponsor. In 2009,
Little Caesars
Little Caesar Enterprises Inc. (doing business as Little Caesars) is an American multi-national pizza chain. Based on 2020 statistics, Little Caesars is the third-largest pizza chain by total sales in the United States, behind Pizza Hut and ...
became the title sponsor of the game after General Motors and Chrysler reorganized under bankruptcy protection. Ford remained as a sponsor. In 2011, the three automakers, along with the
UAW
The International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace, and Agricultural Implement Workers of America, better known as the United Auto Workers (UAW), is an American Labor unions in the United States, labor union that represents workers in the Un ...
, began contributing $100,000 jointly to become presenting sponsors of the game.
A bowl record crowd of 60,624 fans witnessed the
2007 bowl game between the
Purdue Boilermakers
The Purdue Boilermakers are the official intercollegiate athletics teams representing Purdue University, located in West Lafayette, Indiana. As is common with athletic nicknames, the Boilermakers nickname is also used as colloquial designation ...
and the
Central Michigan Chippewas
The Central Michigan Chippewas are the intercollegiate athletic teams that represent Central Michigan University (CMU), located in Mount Pleasant, Michigan. The school fields sixteen men's and women's intercollegiate teams that compete at the ...
.
On April 12, 2010, it was announced that the Big Ten Conference had extended its affiliation with the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl (Big Ten no. 8) through the 2013 season. Also the Sun Belt Conference agreed to a secondary tie-in that would allow a Sun Belt Conference team to play in the Detroit-based game should the Big Ten Conference not have an available bowl-eligible team to play.
In August 2013, the
Detroit Lions announced that it would hold a new bowl game at Ford Field beginning in 2014, between the Big Ten and an
Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) opponent.
While Pizza Bowl organizers attempted to move the bowl to
Comerica Park
Comerica Park is a baseball stadium located in Downtown Detroit. It has been the home of Major League Baseball's Detroit Tigers since 2000, when the team left Tiger Stadium.
History Construction
Founded in 1894, the Tigers had played at the c ...
(which is owned by Little Caesars' parent company
Ilitch Holdings
Ilitch Holdings, Inc. is an American holding company established in 1999 to provide all companies owned by Mike and Marian Ilitch with professional and technical services. Its privately held businesses include Little Caesars Pizza, the National H ...
) and convert it to an outdoor game, these plans never came to fruition.
In August 2014, the Lions announced that the new game would be known as the Quick Lane Bowl
The Quick Lane Bowl is a post-season college football bowl game certified by the NCAA that began play in the 2014 season. Backed by the Detroit Lions of the National Football League, the game features a bowl-eligible team from the Big Ten Confe ...
, and that it would be held on the same day—December 26—that the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl was traditionally held on.[ In a statement to '' Crain's Detroit Business'', Motor City Bowl executive director Ken Hoffman confirmed that "there is no Pizza Bowl for 2014. We will have to see about the future", implying that the game has been cancelled indefinitely in favor of the Quick Lane Bowl.] The MAC holds a secondary tie-in for the Quick Lane Bowl.
Game results
MVPs
Appearances by team
There were 17 playings of the bowl (34 total appearances).
;Teams with multiple appearances
;Teams with a single appearance
Won: Boston College, Connecticut
Connecticut () is the southernmost state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. Its capita ...
, Florida Atlantic, FIU, Memphis
Memphis most commonly refers to:
* Memphis, Egypt, a former capital of ancient Egypt
* Memphis, Tennessee, a major American city
Memphis may also refer to:
Places United States
* Memphis, Alabama
* Memphis, Florida
* Memphis, Indiana
* Memp ...
, Mississippi
Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...
, Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Western Pennsylvania, the second-most populous city in Pennsylva ...
Loss: Akron
Akron () is the fifth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Summit County. It is located on the western edge of the Glaciated Allegheny Plateau, about south of downtown Cleveland. As of the 2020 Census, the city ...
, BYU
Brigham Young University (BYU, sometimes referred to colloquially as The Y) is a private research university in Provo, Utah. It was founded in 1875 by religious leader Brigham Young and is sponsored by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day S ...
, Louisville
Louisville ( , , ) is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the 28th most-populous city in the United States. Louisville is the historical seat and, since 2003, the nominal seat of Jefferson County, on the Indiana border.
...
, Middle Tennessee
Middle Tennessee is one of the three Grand Divisions of the U.S. state of Tennessee that composes roughly the central portion of the state. It is delineated according to state law as 41 of the state's 95 counties. Middle Tennessee contains the ...
, Northwestern, Ohio
Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...
, Western Kentucky
Western Kentucky is the western portion of the U.S. state of Kentucky. It generally includes part or all of several more widely recognized regions of the state.
;Always included
* The Jackson Purchase, the state's westernmost generally recogniz ...
, Western Michigan
West Michigan and Western Michigan are terms for an arbitrary region in the U.S. state of Michigan's Lower Peninsula. Most narrowly it refers to the Grand Rapids- Muskegon-Holland area, and more broadly to most of the region along the Lower Pen ...
Appearances by conference
See also
* List of Little Caesars Pizza Bowl broadcasters
References
External links
*
{{Bowl game navbox
Defunct college football bowls
Sports in Pontiac, Michigan
Recurring sporting events established in 1997
1997 establishments in Michigan
Recurring sporting events disestablished in 2013
2013 disestablishments in Michigan
American football in Michigan