Little Caesars Pizza Bowl (defunct) | |
---|---|
Motor City Bowl | |
Stadium | Ford Field |
Location | Detroit, Michigan |
Previous stadiums | Pontiac Silverdome (1997–2001) |
Previous locations | Pontiac, Michigan (1997–2001) |
Operated | 1997–2013 |
Conference tie-ins | Big Ten, MAC Sun Belt (alternate) |
Payout | US$750,000 per team |
Succeeded by | Quick Lane Bowl |
Sponsors | |
Former names | |
Ford Motor City Bowl (1997) Motor City Bowl (1998–2008) | |
2013 matchup | |
Pittsburgh vs. Bowling Green (Pitt 30–27) |
The Little Caesars Pizza Bowl (known as the Motor City Bowl until 2009) was a post-season college football bowl game that was played annually from 1997 to 2013. The first five games (1997–2001) were played at the Pontiac Silverdome in Pontiac, Michigan, and moved to the 65,000-seat Ford Field in downtown Detroit, Michigan 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 in 1984–85.
The Little Caesars Pizza Bowl featured a bowl-eligible team from the Mid-American Conference (usually the winner of the MAC Championship Game, 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) playing a bowl-eligible team from the Big Ten Conference. 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, 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). Organizers explored the possibility of moving the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl to nearby Comerica Park as an outdoor game, but the game would instead be cancelled.