Dorothy Brush "Random Thoughts" Published Jan. 5, 2005

Bowl season feels like an onslaught

It all started Dec. 14 in New Orleans and ended last night, Jan. 4, in Miami. The "it" I'm talking about is, what else but, college football. After that first game on the 14th things were calm until Christmas week when five games were played from the 21st right up to Christmas Eve when the Hawaii Bowl brought a short halt to the onslaught.

Christmas dinners were hardly digested until football fields across the nation saw action again. Two games on the 27th, another two on the 28th, followed by two more on the 29th. Four games were played on the 30th and another four on the 31st. The first day of 2005 brought fans six games from morning till late evening. That was not the end. On Jan. 3, back in New Orleans, the Sugar Bowl held center stage. Finally on the 4th, Miami's Orange Bowl ended the season.

It was in Pasadena, CA that the idea for a post season football game began. The Tournament of Roses committee arranged for a tournament game on Jan. 1, 1902 between the national co-champions Michigan and Stanford. Michigan triumphed 49-0.

No more games until 14 years later when the idea was revived and the second game was played January 1, 1916. It was canceled for two years during WWI, and then the granddaddy of bowl games became a New Year's Day tradition. The choice of bowl as part of the name fit one of the definitions of a bowl - a bowl-shaped edifice such as a football stadium.

In 1925 the East-West Shrine game for charity was introduced. In 1932 Miami, Florida sponsored a college football match-up as a lure to tourists during the Depression years. That game was known as the Palm Festival but the next year it was renamed the Orange Bowl. New Orleans' Sugar Bowl began in 1935 and Dallas came on board with the Cotton Bowl in 1937. For many years those four post season games were enough.

Jacksonville joined the small group in 1946 with the Gator Bowl. By 1976 there were 11 bowl games and in 1991 the number had ballooned to 18. That was the year a savvy company recognized they could push their product by becoming a partner in these annual events by attaching their name. As yet it hasn't gotten out of hand but MPC Computers, Continental Tires and GMAC Bowls don't fire the imagination.

In 2004 28 bowl games were played. Schools and conferences benefit by the $160 million raised. Cities too enjoy the dollars spent by visitors. But when is enough, enough? Mark Wiedmer, sports columnist for the Chattanooga paper, wrote recently, "These bowls have become like computer spam of kudzu, multiplying at a rate so unmanageable as to soon have more bowl games than Division I schools to play in them."

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Dorothy Copus Brush is a Fairfield Glade resident and Crossville Chronicle staffwriter whose column is published each Wednesday.