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NCAA Awards Second
Bowl Game To San Diego |
The Poinsettia Bowl “received clearance to start business” yesterday when the NCAA granted organizers of the Holiday Bowl a second postseason game for San Diego, beating out Toronto and San Jose, according to Brent Schrotenboer of the SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE. The game will be played at Qualcomm Stadium on December 22 at 7:00pm PT between a team from the Mountain West Conference and an at-large team. ESPN2 will carry the game live. Unlike the Holiday Bowl, which annually receives support from the city’s hotel tax fund, the Poinsettia Bowl “will not seek city tax support.” Holiday and Poinsettia Bowl Exec Dir Bruce Binkowski said the new game “gives our Holiday Bowl fans a chance to attend another bowl game.” Holiday and Poinsettia Bowl President Steve CCushman signed a $2M “letter of the credit for the NCAA to secure” the game, and organizers expect to have a $750,000 payout to each team and draw around 40,000 fans (
SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE, 4/21).
DEATH VALLEY: In San Jose, David Pollak reports the NCAA’s Postseason Football Licensing Subcommittee “pulled the plug on” the Silicon Valley Football Classic. The Subcommittee “decided to cap the number of bowl games” at 28. The Silicon Valley game “consistently garnered the poorest TV ratings of the college football season, and was among the lowest attended since it began” in ’00. NCAA Managing Dir for Football & Baseball Dennis Poppe said that this was “only the second time that his organization withdrew its backing of an existing bowl game,” the first being in ’03 with the Seattle Bowl. Pollak notes the primary sponsors for the initial game, Palm and Knight Ridder, “withdrew after their two-year contracts expired,” and organizers “never were able to find a company willing to buy long-term naming rights.” The game has “consistently operated in the red” (MERCURY NEWS, 4/21).
