The All-American Bowl was an annual postseason
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 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 ...
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 ...
from 1977 to 1990. The game was known as the Hall of Fame Classic from 1977 to 1985.
In 1986, the National Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame decided to relocate the Hall of Fame bowl game to
Tampa, Florida
Tampa ( ) is a city on the Gulf Coast of the United States, Gulf Coast of the U.S. state of Florida. Tampa's borders include the north shore of Tampa Bay and the east shore of Old Tampa Bay. Tampa is the largest city in the Tampa Bay area and t ...
, where it eventually became known as the Outback Bowl (now the
ReliaQuest Bowl
The ReliaQuest Bowl is an annual college football bowl game played in Tampa, Florida. The event was known as the Hall of Fame Bowl from 1986 to 1995 and the Outback Bowl from 1996 to 2022. It was held at Tampa Stadium from 1986 until 1999, when it ...
). The game in Birmingham continued as the All-American Bowl, which was played for five years under a different organizing body.
When the
Southeastern Conference
The Southeastern Conference (SEC) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference whose member institutions are located primarily in the South Central United States, South Central and Southeastern United States. Its 16 members in ...
expanded to twelve schools and began contesting a
SEC Championship Game
The SEC Championship Game is an annual American football game that has determined the Southeastern Conference's season champion since 1992. For its first 32 seasons, the championship game pitted the Eastern Division regular season champion again ...
in 1992, Birmingham officials chose to host the conference title game and abandon the All-American Bowl. The SEC championship was moved to Atlanta's
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 ...
two years later, leaving Legion Field without any Division I-A postseason college football until 2006, when
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 ...
and the city agreed to establish a new post-season game, the
Birmingham Bowl.
The game
The All-American Bowl played host to a number of successful teams from the premier college football conferences of the time (the
Atlantic Coast Conference
The Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference in the United States. Headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, the ACC's eighteen member universities compete in the National Collegiate Athlet ...
, Big Eight (now
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 ...
),
Big Ten Conference
The Big Ten Conference (stylized B1G, formerly the Western Conference and the Big Nine Conference, among others) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference in the United States. Founded as the Intercollegiate Conference of Fa ...
,
Southeastern Conference
The Southeastern Conference (SEC) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference whose member institutions are located primarily in the South Central United States, South Central and Southeastern United States. Its 16 members in ...
and
Southwest Conference
The Southwest Conference (SWC) was an NCAA Division I college athletic conference in the United States that existed from 1914 to 1996. Composed primarily of schools from Texas, at various times the conference also included schools from Oklaho ...
). All of them placed teams in the All-American Bowl in various years. At least one of the power conferences fielded teams in the All-American Bowl in every year of its existence; often, two of those premier conferences met in the game. The
Southeastern Conference
The Southeastern Conference (SEC) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference whose member institutions are located primarily in the South Central United States, South Central and Southeastern United States. Its 16 members in ...
and
Atlantic Coast Conference
The Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference in the United States. Headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, the ACC's eighteen member universities compete in the National Collegiate Athlet ...
each placed five teams into the All-American Bowl. The
Big Ten Conference
The Big Ten Conference (stylized B1G, formerly the Western Conference and the Big Nine Conference, among others) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference in the United States. Founded as the Intercollegiate Conference of Fa ...
proved to be the least successful conference, having never won a game despite placing teams in four different years.
Game results
Most valuable players
Conference records
*
Southwest Conference
The Southwest Conference (SWC) was an NCAA Division I college athletic conference in the United States that existed from 1914 to 1996. Composed primarily of schools from Texas, at various times the conference also included schools from Oklaho ...
3–0 (1.000)
*
Atlantic Coast Conference
The Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference in the United States. Headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, the ACC's eighteen member universities compete in the National Collegiate Athlet ...
4–1 (.800)
*
Southeastern Conference
The Southeastern Conference (SEC) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference whose member institutions are located primarily in the South Central United States, South Central and Southeastern United States. Its 16 members in ...
3–2 (.600)
*
Western Athletic Conference
The Western Athletic Conference (WAC) is an NCAA Division I conference. The WAC covers a broad expanse of the Western United States with member institutions located in Arizona, California, Texas, Utah and Washington (state), Washington.
Due to ...
1–1 (.500)
*
Big Eight Conference
The Big Eight Conference was a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA)-affiliated Division I-A college athletic association that sponsored American football, football. It was formed in January 1907 as the Missouri Valley Intercollegiate ...
1–2 (.333)
*
Big Ten Conference
The Big Ten Conference (stylized B1G, formerly the Western Conference and the Big Nine Conference, among others) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference in the United States. Founded as the Intercollegiate Conference of Fa ...
0–4 (.000)
Ranked teams
On several occasions, the All-American Bowl winners finished the season ranked in the AP Top Twenty poll:
*Texas A&M finished #19 in the final 1978 AP poll after defeating #19 Iowa State.
*West Virginia finished #16 in the final 1983 AP poll after defeating Kentucky.
*Kentucky finished #19 in the final 1984 AP poll and the final UPI poll after defeating #20 Wisconsin.
*Georgia Tech finished #19 in the final 1985 AP poll after defeating Michigan State.
*Texas Tech finished #19 in the final 1989 AP poll after defeating #20 Duke.
References
See also
*
List of college bowl games
This is a list of college football bowl games, including those proposed and defunct. Six bowl games are part of the College Football Playoff, a selection system that creates bowl matchups involving twelve of the top-ranked teams in the NCAA Divis ...
{{All-American Bowl navbox
Defunct college football bowls
American football competitions in Birmingham, Alabama
College football bowls in Alabama