2007 Motor City Bowl

2007 Motor City Bowl
1234 Total
Purdue 2113710 51
Central Michigan 67287 48
DateDecember 26, 2007
Season2007
StadiumFord Field
LocationDetroit, Michigan
MVPCurtis Painter (Purdue)
FavoritePurdue by 8½[1]
RefereeBrad Allen (ACC)
Attendance60,624[2]
PayoutUS$750,000 per team[3]
United States TV coverage
NetworkESPN
AnnouncersDave Pasch, Andre Ware
Motor City Bowl
 < 2006  2008

The 2007 Motor City Bowl, part of the 2007-08 NCAA football bowl games season, occurred on December 26, 2007 at Ford Field in Detroit, Michigan, United States.

The Central Michigan Chippewas, who won their second straight Mid-American Conference championship on the same field on December 1, returned to take on the Purdue Boilermakers, whom bowl officials invited from the Big Ten Conference. The bowl was a rematch of a game played on September 15 in West Lafayette, Indiana. The Boilermakers won that game, 45–22. CMU had defeated Middle Tennessee in the 2006 game.

Purdue dominated the first half of the game, scoring 3 touchdowns in the first quarter to Central's 2 field goals, and by halftime they had assured a 21-point lead over the Chippewas. Central came back in the third quarter, scoring 4 touchdowns to tie the game. The final score was 51–48, with Purdue kicker Chris Summers kicking a game-winning field goal as time expired. Purdue quarterback Curtis Painter threw for 543 pass yards, setting a Motor City Bowl record and placing him fourth on the list of all-time bowl game performances. His total broke the Purdue school record.

The attendance of 60,624 broke the Motor City Bowl record, which had been set in 2006 by Central Michigan and Middle Tennessee (54,113[4]).

  1. ^ World Feature Syndicate via Long Beach Press-Telegram, Dec. 20, 2007
  2. ^ "20080128234 | Motor City Bowl Scores Ratings Increase | Football". Archived from the original on January 30, 2008. Retrieved January 28, 2008.
  3. ^ "ncaafootball.com - Bowl Schedules/Results". Archived from the original on August 3, 2007. Retrieved September 19, 2009.
  4. ^ "motorcitybowl.com: Year-by-Year Results". Archived from the original on April 15, 2008. Retrieved January 28, 2008.