The 2012

BBVA Compass BBVA USA was a bank headquartered in Birmingham, Alabama. It was a subsidiary of Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria from 2007 until 2021, when it was acquired by PNC Financial Services. It operated mainly in Alabama, Arizona, California, Colorado, ...

Bowl, the sixth 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 January 7,

2012 2012 was designated as: *International Year of Cooperatives *International Year of Sustainable Energy for All Events January *January 4 – The Cicada 3301 internet hunt begins. * January 12 – Peaceful protests begin in the R ...

, at

Legion Field Legion Field is an outdoor stadium in the southeastern United States in Birmingham, Alabama, primarily designed to be used as a venue for American football, but occasionally used for other large outdoor events. Opened in 1927, it is named in ...

Birmingham, Alabama Birmingham ( ) is a city in the north central region of Alabama, United States. It is the county seat of Jefferson County, Alabama, Jefferson County. The population was 200,733 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the List ...

, as part of the 2011–12 NCAA Bowl season. The game, which was telecast at 12:00 p.m. CT 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

SMU Mustangs The SMU Mustangs are the sport, athletic teams that represent Southern Methodist University in University Park, Texas, United States. SMU was founded in 1911 and joined the Southwest Conference, competing against Baylor Bears, Baylor, Rice Owls, ...

Conference USA Conference USA (CUSA) is a collegiate athletic conference of member institutions in the Southern and Western United States. The conference participates in the NCAA's Division I in all sports. CUSA's offices are located in Dallas, Texas. Mem ...

versus the

Pittsburgh Panthers The Pittsburgh Panthers, commonly also referred to as the Pitt Panthers, are the athletic teams representing the University of Pittsburgh, although the term is colloquially used to refer to other aspects of the university such as alumni, facul ...

of the

Big East Conference The Big East Conference (stylized as BIG EAST) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference that competes in National Collegiate Athletic Association, NCAA NCAA Division I, Division I in 10 men's sports and 12 women's sports. H ...

. This was Pittsburgh's second consecutive appearance in the game, and just as in the previous contest the Panthers were led by an interim head coach,

Keith Patterson Keith Patterson (born May 20, 1964) is an American football coach. He is the head football coach at Abilene Christian University. Prior to that he was the defensive coordinator at Texas Tech University; while there, Patterson served as the team ...

, after

Todd Graham Michael Todd Graham (born December 5, 1964) is an American college football coach and former player who serves as an offensive analyst for TCU. He was most recently the head football coach at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. Playing car ...

resigned on December 13, 2011.

Teams

Pittsburgh and SMU met for the first time in 29 years in this BBVA Compass Bowl, which normally pairs a Big East conference team against a team from the Southeastern Conference. The SEC conference did not have enough bowl-eligible teams this season and the SMU football team was selected by the organizers to play in the bowl. Pittsburgh and SMU had met five times previously, the last time at the 1983 Cotton Bowl on New Year's Day, when the Mustangs won 7–3.

Pittsburgh

SMU

References

{{SMU Mustangs bowl game navbox BBVA Compass Bowl Birmingham Bowl Pittsburgh Panthers football bowl games SMU Mustangs football bowl games BBVA Compass Bowl BBVA Compass Bowl