Penn St. to Cotton Bowl vs. Memphis
Memphis is going to the Cotton Bowl to represent the Group of Five teams against Penn State, and the Tigers’ coach is going to a Power Five school.
A day after winning the American Athletic Conference championship game, Memphis (12-1) was the highest-ranked Group of Five team in the final College Football Playoff rankings Sunday at No. 17. That expected announcement came only a few hours after Mike Norvell was introduced as Florida State’s new coach.
The Tigers (12-1) will play Penn State (10-2) of the Big Ten on Dec. 28 at AT&T Stadium, the home stadium of the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys.
Norvell has said he wants to coach the Tigers in the Cotton Bowl after leading the Tigers to the best four-year stretch in school history. They were 38-15, went to three A AC championships games in that span and now are in their first New Year’s Six game.
Penn State is playing in its 50th bowl overall, and going to the Cotton Bowl for the first time in 45 years.
The Nittany Lions, who finished No. 10 in the final CFP rankings, have made it to a bowl in all six seasons under coach James Franklin, who just reached an agreement on a new contract that extended his deal through 2025.
Wisconsin got the Big Ten’s spot in the Rose Bowl after finishing 8th in the CFP, a day after the Badgers lost to Ohio State in the league’s championship game.
Penn State still got to a New Year’s Six game, and is going to its first Cotton Bowl since beating Baylor 41-20 on New Year’s Day 1975, three years after they beat Texas in that bowl. There was a 13-13 tie with SMU in their only other Cotton Bowl appearance, after the Nittany Lions were 9-0 in the 1947 regular season.
This will be the first meeting ever between the Tigers and the Nittany Lions, who are 2918-2 in bowl games.
Memphis is in a bowl game for the sixth consecutive season, the longest stretch in school history. It is their 12th bowl overall, but the Tigers have lost the last four, including 37-34 to Wake Forest in the Birmingham Bowl last year.
The Tigers finished two spots ahead of Boise State in the final CFP rankings. Cincinnati, which lost in the AAC championship game to Memphis after also losing to the Tigers in the regular season finale, was 21st.