The 2011

Kraft Kraft Foods Group, Inc. was an American food manufacturing and processing conglomerate (company), conglomerate, split from Kraft Foods Inc. on October 1, 2012, and was headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. It became part of Kraft Heinz on July ...

Fight Hunger Bowl The San Francisco Bowl was an annual postseason college football bowl game certified by the NCAA and played in the San Francisco Bay Area. Originally named the Diamond Walnut San Francisco Bowl during its first two editions from 2002 to 2003, it w ...

, the 10th edition of the game, was a post-season American

college football College football is gridiron football that is played by teams of amateur Student athlete, student-athletes at universities and colleges. It was through collegiate competition that gridiron football American football in the United States, firs ...

bowl game In North America, a bowl game, or simply bowl, is one of a number of postseason college football games primarily played by NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) teams. For most of its history, the FBS did not use a playoff tourname ...

, held on December 31,

2011 The year marked the start of a Arab Spring, series of protests and revolutions throughout the Arab world advocating for democracy, reform, and economic recovery, later leading to the depositions of world leaders in Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen ...

AT&T Park Oracle Park is a ballpark in the South of Market, San Francisco, SoMa district of San Francisco, California. Since 2000, it has been the home of the San Francisco Giants of Major League Baseball (MLB). The stadium stands along San Francisco Bay ...

San Francisco, California San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

as part of the 2011–12 NCAA Bowl season. The game, which was telecast at 12:30 p.m.

Pacific Time The Pacific Time Zone (PT) is a time zone encompassing parts of western Canada, the western United States, and western Mexico. Places in this zone observe standard time by subtracting eight hours from Coordinated Universal Time ( UTC−08:00). ...

(3:30 p.m.

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) on

ESPN ESPN (an initialism of their original name, which was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by the Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Commu ...

, featured the

UCLA Bruins The UCLA Bruins are the athletic teams that represent the University of California, Los Angeles. The Bruin men's and women's teams participate in NCAA Division I as part of the Big Ten Conference and the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF ...

(6–7) versus the

Illinois Fighting Illini The Illinois Fighting Illini () are the College athletics, intercollegiate athletic teams that represent the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. The university offers 10 men's and 11 women's Varsity team, varsity sports. The university op ...

(6–6). The Bruins, with a losing record, were granted a waiver to play in a bowl game by the NCAA after the

Pac-12 conference The Pac-12 Conference is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference in the Western United States. It participates at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) NCAA Division I, Division I level for all sports, and its Co ...

did not have enough eligible teams to fill its bowl commitments. Both teams fired their head coach this season after .500 records.UCLA was 6–6 in the regular season before losing in the

Pac-12 Championship Game The Pac-12 Football Championship Game was an annual college football game held by the Pac-12 Conference to determine the season's conference champion. The game from the 2011–2021 seasons had the champion of the North Division against the cham ...

Mike Johnson James Michael Johnson (born January 30, 1972) is an American lawyer and politician serving as the List of speakers of the United States House of Representatives, 56th speaker of the United States House of Representatives since 2023. A member ...

, who replaced

Rick Neuheisel Richard Gerald Neuheisel Jr. (; born February 7, 1961) is an American football analyst, coach, and former player. He served as the head football coach at the University of Colorado Boulder from 1995 to 1999, at the University of Washington from ...

, is the interim coach for UCLA. The Fighting Illini were led by interim coach

Vic Koenning Victor Emanuel Koenning Jr. (born February 26, 1960) is a former professional American football player, and current Outside Linebacker coach at Louisiana–Monroe. He was the interim head coach at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in ...

while their newly hired head coach

Tim Beckman Timothy David Beckman (born January 19, 1965) is a former American football coach. He served as the head football coach at the University of Toledo from 2009 to 2011 and at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign from 2012 to 2014, comp ...

, who replaced

Ron Zook Ronald Andrew Zook (; born April 28, 1954) is an American football coach who is a special teams quality control coach at the University of Maryland. He was the head football coach at the University of Florida from 2002 to 2004 and the Universit ...

, was on the sidelines. UCLA lost the matchup and subsequently finished the season with a losing record (6–8).

Teams

Since 1946, the two universities had met 11 times with three previous meetings in a bowl game (

1947 Rose Bowl The 1947 Rose Bowl was a college football bowl game, the 33rd edition of the Rose Bowl Game. The Illinois Fighting Illini defeated the UCLA Bruins, 45–14. Illinois halfbacks Buddy Young and Jules Rykovich shared the Player of the Game awar ...

1984 Rose Bowl The 1984 Rose Bowl game, played on Monday, January 2, was the 70th edition. The unranked UCLA Bruins upset the #4 Illinois Fighting Illini by a score of 45–9. Rick Neuheisel, UCLA quarterback, was named the Player of the Game.1991 Hancock Bowl). UCLA held a 6–5 edge over Illinois, including winning the last four games. The last game prior to this one was in 2004, when UCLA defeated Illinois 35–17.

Illinois

Illinois featured a pro style offense and a multiple defense. Jason Ford (155-600 yards, 7 TDs) and Nathan Scheelhaase (169-514 yards, 6 TDs) were the top rushers. Quarterback

Nathan Scheelhaase Nathan Scheelhaase (born November 8, 1990) is an American football coach and former quarterback who is the offensive assistant and passing game specialist for the Los Angeles Rams of the National Football League (NFL). He previously served as th ...

had completed 166 of 261 passes for 1,971 yards, and 12 TDs coming into this game with receiver A.J. Jenkins (84-1, 196 yards, 7 TDs) as his target. Defensively, the team was led by Jonathan Brown (102 tackles), Whitney Mercilus (14.5 sacks, -95 yards) and Trulon Henry (2 interceptions, 27 yards, 1 TD) and Terry Hawthorne (2 interceptions).

UCLA

UCLA came into the game with its Pistol offense which allowed Johnathan Franklin to run for 947 yards, 5 TDs; quarterback

Kevin Prince Kevin Christopher Prince (born November 28, 1989) is a former American football quarterback. He played at Crespi Carmelite High School in Encino, California. He played college football at UCLA. Prince was selected by head coach Rick Neuh ...

to pass 112 times for 1,627 yards and 10 TDs; Nelson Rasario to catch for 61 passes for 1,106 yards, 4 TDs. The Bruins' 4-3 defense was led by Pat Larimore (81 tackles), Datone Jones (3.0 sacks, 7 yards) and Andrew Abbott (4 interceptions, 37 yards).

Scoring summary

First quarter scoring: No score Second quarter scoring: UCLA – Taylor Embree 16-yard pass from

(Tyler Gonzalez kick); ILL – Derek Dimke 36-yard field goal Third quarter scoring: ILL – T. Hawthorne 39-yard interception return (Dimke kick) Fourth quarter scoring: ILL – Dimke 37-yard field goal; ILL – A. J. Jenkins 60-yard pass from N. Scheelhaase (Dimke kick); UCLA – Nelson Rosario 38-yard pass from Prince (Gonzalez kick),

Notes

References

External links

Game summary
at

Box score
at

{{DEFAULTSORT:2011 Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl (12) 2011–12 NCAA football bowl games Redbox Bowl Illinois Fighting Illini football bowl games UCLA Bruins football bowl games

Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl The San Francisco Bowl was an annual postseason college football bowl game certified by the NCAA and played in the San Francisco Bay Area. Originally named the Diamond Walnut San Francisco Bowl during its first two editions from 2002 to 2003, it w ...

2011 in San Francisco December 2011 sports events in the United States