The 2023 Guaranteed Rate Bowl was a

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 26, 2023, at

Chase Field Chase Field, formerly Bank One Ballpark, is a retractable roof, retractable-roof stadium in downtown Phoenix, Arizona. It is the ballpark of Major League Baseball's Arizona Diamondbacks. It opened in 1998 Arizona Diamondbacks season, 1998, the ...

Phoenix, Arizona Phoenix ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of cities and towns in Arizona#List of cities and towns, most populous city of the U.S. state of Arizona. With over 1.6 million residents at the 2020 census, it is the ...

. The 34th annual

Guaranteed Rate Bowl The Rate Bowl is an annual college football bowl game that has been played in the state of Arizona since 1989, under several different names. Played as the Copper Bowl from inception through 1996, it was known as the Insight.com Bowl from 1997 ...

featured

Kansas Kansas ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Nebraska to the north; Missouri to the east; Oklahoma to the south; and Colorado to the west. Kansas is named a ...

of the

Big 12 Conference The Big 12 Conference is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference in the United States. It consists of 16 full-member universities (3 private universities and 13 public universities) in the states of Arizona, Colorado, Florida ...

and

UNLV The University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) is a public land-grant research university in Paradise, Nevada, United States. The campus is about east of the Las Vegas Strip. It was formerly part of the University of Nevada from 1957 to 1969. ...

of the

Mountain West Conference The Mountain West Conference (MW) is a collegiate athletic conference in the Western United States, participating in NCAA Division I. Its football teams compete in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). The MW officially began operations on Ja ...

. The game began at approximately 7:10p.m. MST and was aired 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 ...

. The Guaranteed Rate Bowl was one of the 2023–24 bowl games concluding the 2023 FBS football season. The game's title sponsor was residential mortgage company

Guaranteed Rate Guaranteed Rate Companies, doing business as Rate, is an American residential mortgage company headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. Founded in 2000 by Victor Ciardelli, the company had $55 billion in funded volume in 2022, down 25% since 2020. As ...

. Kansas won the game 49–36. Kansas quarterback Jason Bean, who won offensive MVP, set the Guaranteed Rate Bowl record for passing touchdowns with 6, split between receivers Luke Grimm and Lawrence Arnold who both had 3, tying former Jayhawk

Dezmon Briscoe Dezmon Jerrod Briscoe (born August 31, 1989) is an American former professional American football, football wide receiver. He was selected by the Cincinnati Bengals in the sixth round of the 2010 NFL draft. He played college football at the Univ ...

's record for receiving touchdowns.

Teams

The game featured the

Kansas Jayhawks The Kansas Jayhawks, commonly referred to as simply KU or Kansas, are the athletic teams that represent the University of Kansas. KU is one of three schools List of college athletic programs in Kansas, in the state of Kansas that participate in ...

of the

and the

UNLV Rebels The UNLV Rebels are the college athletics in the United States, intercollegiate athletics teams that represent the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV). The Rebels compete in the NCAA Division I (NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision, Footb ...

of the

. The game was the third meeting between Kansas and UNLV with the all-time series tied at 1–1 prior to the game. The teams' had previously met in 2003 with the Jayhawks winning 46–24.

Kansas Jayhawks

The Jayhawks entered the game with an 8–4 record (5–4 in Big 12), tied for seventh place in their conference. This was Kansas' second Guaranteed Rate Bowl; they previously won the 2008 Insight Bowl when the bowl was known by that name. It was the Jayhawks' second consecutive season playing in a bowl game, something only accomplished once before in program history (2007–2008).

UNLV Rebels

The Rebels entered the game with a 9–4 record (6–2 in Mountain West). Winning the three-way tiebreaker for first place in their conference, the Rebels hosted the 2023 Mountain West Championship Game, losing to

Boise State Boise State University (BSU) is a public research university in Boise, Idaho, United States. Founded in 1932 by the Episcopal Church, it became an independent junior college in 1934 and has been awarding baccalaureate and master's degrees It ...

, 44–20. This was UNLV's first Guaranteed Rate Bowl. It was also the Rebel's first bowl appearance since the 2014 Heart of Dallas Bowl, following the 2013 season.

Game summary

Statistics

References

External links

Game statistics
at statbroadcast.com {{UNLV Rebels bowl game navbox

Rate Bowl

Kansas Jayhawks football bowl games UNLV Rebels football bowl games 2023 in Phoenix, Arizona