Orange Bowl

football game

Also known as: Palm Festival

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Orange Bowl, American college postseason football game played on New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day in Miami. It is one of six bowls that take turns hosting the semifinals of the College Football Playoff that determines the national champion of Division I college football (the others are the Cotton Bowl, Fiesta Bowl, Peach Bowl, Rose Bowl, and Sugar Bowl).

(Read Walter Camp’s 1903 Britannica essay on inventing American football.)

The bowl game was first played in 1933 to attract winter tourists to Florida a month before their usual arrival. Embraced by local businessmen, it also benefited the struggling young University of Miami, which played in the early games; by 1936, however, the team’s participation was no longer automatic. Thereafter, at least one of the participating teams came from the South, until the mid-1950s, when the bowl was opened to high-ranking teams nationwide. The champion of the Big 8 Conference (now the Big 12) was one of the participants in 38 of the 42 games from 1954 through 1995. In 1998 the Orange Bowl joined the Bowl Championship Series (BCS), and in 2014 it became part of the College Football Playoff semifinal rotation. Now the game has a tie-in with the Atlantic Coast Conference and generally features its champion unless the team or the bowl is participating in a national championship semifinal.

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The event was originally called the Palm Festival, but its present name was adopted in 1935. The game was moved in 1938 to the newly constructed Orange Bowl stadium, where it remained until it relocated to Joe Robbie Stadium (now called Sun Life Stadium) in 1995. The Orange Bowl Festival features, in addition to the football game, a parade, a tennis tournament, a basketball tournament, a fireworks display, and a sailboat regatta.

A list of Orange Bowl results is provided in the table.

Orange Bowl¹
season	result
¹Part of Bowl Championship Series (BCS) from 1998–99 until 2013–14; part of College Football Playoff (CFP) from 2014–15.
²The first two games were part of the Miami Palm Festival.
³BCS national championship game.
⁴CFP semifinal.
1932–33²	Miami (Fla.)	7	Manhattan	0
1933–34²	Duquesne	33	Miami (Fla.)	7
1934–35	Bucknell	26	Miami (Fla.)	0
1935–36	Catholic	20	Mississippi	19
1936–37	Duquesne	13	Mississippi State	12
1937–38	Auburn	6	Michigan State	0
1938–39	Tennessee	17	Oklahoma	0
1939–40	Georgia Tech	21	Missouri	7
1940–41	Mississippi State	14	Georgetown	7
1941–42	Georgia	40	Texas Christian	26
1942–43	Alabama	37	Boston College	21
1943–44	Louisiana State	19	Texas A&M	14
1944–45	Tulsa	26	Georgia Tech	12
1945–46	Miami (Fla.)	13	Holy Cross	6
1946–47	Rice	8	Tennessee	0
1947–48	Georgia Tech	20	Kansas	14
1948–49	Texas	41	Georgia	28
1949–50	Santa Clara	21	Kentucky	13
1950–51	Clemson	15	Miami (Fla.)	14
1951–52	Georgia Tech	17	Baylor	14
1952–53	Alabama	61	Syracuse	6
1953–54	Oklahoma	7	Maryland	0
1954–55	Duke	34	Nebraska	7
1955–56	Oklahoma	20	Maryland	6
1956–57	Colorado	27	Clemson	21
1957–58	Oklahoma	48	Duke	21
1958–59	Oklahoma	21	Syracuse	6
1959–60	Georgia	14	Missouri	0
1960–61	Missouri	21	Navy	14
1961–62	Louisiana State	25	Colorado	7
1962–63	Alabama	17	Oklahoma	0
1963–64	Nebraska	13	Auburn	7
1964–65	Texas	21	Alabama	17
1965–66	Alabama	39	Nebraska	28
1966–67	Florida	27	Georgia Tech	12
1967–68	Oklahoma	26	Tennessee	24
1968–69	Penn State	15	Kansas	14
1969–70	Penn State	10	Missouri	3
1970–71	Nebraska	17	Louisiana State	12
1971–72	Nebraska	38	Alabama	6
1972–73	Nebraska	40	Notre Dame	6
1973–74	Penn State	16	Louisiana State	9
1974–75	Notre Dame	13	Alabama	11
1975–76	Oklahoma	14	Michigan	6
1976–77	Ohio State	27	Colorado	10
1977–78	Arkansas	31	Oklahoma	6
1978–79	Oklahoma	31	Nebraska	24
1979–80	Oklahoma	24	Florida State	7
1980–81	Oklahoma	18	Florida State	17
1981–82	Clemson	22	Nebraska	15
1982–83	Nebraska	21	Louisiana State	20
1983–84	Miami (Fla.)	31	Nebraska	30
1984–85	Washington	28	Oklahoma	17
1985–86	Oklahoma	25	Penn State	10
1986–87	Oklahoma	42	Arkansas	8
1987–88	Miami (Fla.)	20	Oklahoma	14
1988–89	Miami (Fla.)	23	Nebraska	3
1989–90	Notre Dame	21	Colorado	6
1990–91	Colorado	10	Notre Dame	9
1991–92	Miami (Fla.)	22	Nebraska	0
1992–93	Florida State	27	Nebraska	14
1993–94	Florida State	18	Nebraska	16
1994–95	Nebraska	24	Miami (Fla.)	17
1995–96	Florida State	31	Notre Dame	26
1996–97	Nebraska	41	Virginia Tech	21
1997–98	Nebraska	42	Tennessee	17
1998–99	Florida	31	Syracuse	10
1999–2000	Michigan	35	Alabama	34
2000–01³	Oklahoma	13	Florida State	2
2001–02	Florida	56	Maryland	23
2002–03	Southern California	38	Iowa	17
2003–04	Miami (Fla.)	16	Florida State	14
2004–05³	Southern California	55	Oklahoma	19
2005–06	Penn State	26	Florida State	23
2006–07	Louisville	24	Wake Forest	13
2007–08	Kansas	24	Virginia Tech	21
2008–09	Virginia Tech	20	Cincinnati	7
2009–10	Iowa	24	Georgia Tech	14
2010–11	Stanford	40	Virginia Tech	12
2011–12	West Virginia	70	Clemson	33
2012–13	Florida State	31	Northern Illinois	10
2013–14	Clemson	40	Ohio State	35
2014–15	Georgia Tech	49	Mississippi State	34
2015–16⁴	Clemson	37	Oklahoma	17
2016–17	Florida State	33	Michigan	32
2017–18	Wisconsin	34	Miami (Fla.)	24
2018–19⁴	Alabama	45	Oklahoma	34
2019–20	Florida	36	Virginia	28
2020–21	Texas A&M	41	North Carolina	27
2021–22⁴	Georgia	34	Michigan	11
2022–23	Tennessee	31	Clemson	14
2023–24	Georgia	63	Florida State	3

This article was most recently revised and updated by Amy Tikkanen.