The 2016 Celebration Bowl (officially known as the 2016 Air Force Reserve Celebration Bowl) 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 ...

played on December 17, 2016, at the

Georgia Dome The Georgia Dome was a Stadium#Types, domed stadium in the Southeastern United States. Located in Atlanta between downtown Atlanta, downtown to the east and Vine City to the west, it was owned and operated by the State of Georgia as part of th ...

Atlanta, Georgia Atlanta ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Georgia (U.S. state), most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. It is the county seat, seat of Fulton County, Georg ...

. The second

Celebration Bowl The Celebration Bowl is a postseason college football bowl game, first played in the 2015 NCAA Division I FCS football season, 2015 season, contested between the champions of the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference (MEAC) and the Southwestern Athlet ...

game matched the champion of the

Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference The Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference (MEAC ) is a List of NCAA conferences, collegiate athletic conference whose full members are historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and the Mid-A ...

, against the champion of the

Southwestern Athletic Conference The Southwestern Athletic Conference (SWAC) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference headquartered in Birmingham, Alabama, which is made up of historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) in the Southern United St ...

, the two

historically black Historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) are institutions of higher education in the United States that were established before the Civil Rights Act of 1964 with the intention of serving African Americans. Most are in the Southern U ...

division I conferences. This was the last edition of the Celebration Bowl (and the penultimate college football game) played at the Georgia Dome, as the Dome was demolished in November 2017 following the opening of its successor,

Mercedes-Benz Stadium Mercedes-Benz Stadium is a retractable roof multi-purpose stadium in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. Opened in 2017 as a replacement for the Georgia Dome, it is the home of the Atlanta Falcons of the National Football League (NFL) and Atlanta ...

, three months prior. The third and future editions of the Celebration Bowl were moved to the new stadium.

Teams

The participants for the Celebration Bowl game are based upon the final regular season standings which determine the MEAC football champion and the SWAC football championship Game determining the SWAC representative.

North Carolina Central

North Carolina Central entered the season ranked 4th in both the Sheridan & BoxtoRow polls and was picked to finish 3rd overall in the MEAC. The Eagles started their season with back to back losses to FBS opponents

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and

Western Michigan West Michigan and Western Michigan are terms for a region in the U.S. state of Michigan's Lower Peninsula. Generally, it refers to the Grand Rapids- Muskegon-Holland area, and more broadly to most of the region along the Lower Peninsula's Lake ...

. The Eagles rebounded to win 9 straight, defeating state rival North Carolina A&T in the final MEAC regular season game. The Eagles entered the Celebration Bowl ranked #18 in the FCS.

Grambling

Grambling started the season ranked 5th in national black college football polls and picked 2nd in the SWAC Western division. The Tigers began the season defeating Virginia-Lynchburg and going up 21–0 before watching FBS opponent Arizona rally to defeat them. Grambling rolled after that with 10 straight wins. The Tigers enter the Celebration Bowl ranked #14.

Game summary

Scoring summary

Statistics

References

{{North Carolina Central Eagles bowl game navbox

Celebration Bowl Grambling State Tigers football bowl games North Carolina Central Eagles football bowl games