Falcons going to GMAC Bowl

BGSU has accepted an invitation to play Memphis in the GMAC Bowl Dec. 22 in Mobile, Ala. Kickoff will be at 8 p.m. CST at Ladd-Peebles Stadium.

Murray Cape, chairman of the bowl’s selection committee, formally extended the invitation at a press conference in Mileti Alumni Center.

The bowl bid, the seventh in BGSU football history, “really says a lot, not only for Bowling Green, but for the Mid-American Conference,” said Head Coach Gregg Brandon, adding that the Falcons are the first MAC team to receive an invitation this bowl season.

The teams will take matching 8-3 records into the game, which will be televised on ESPN. Memphis finished second in Conference USA behind Louisville.

Tickets are $45 and may be purchased at the athletic ticket office, by phone at 2-2762 or online at www.bgsufalcons.com. BGSU students may purchase tickets for $15 (limit of two) at the ticket office in Memorial Hall.

“It’s really been a historic season,” said Athletic Director Paul Krebs. This is only the second time that BGSU has gone to bowl games in consecutive years, and the first senior class to record at least eight wins in each of its four seasons, he noted.

BGSU, which defeated Northwestern, 28-24, in last year’s Motor City Bowl, also won the 1991 California Raisin Bowl and the 1992 Las Vegas Bowl. With a 36-12 record over the last four seasons, the Falcons have posted the highest winning percentage of any MAC team during that time.

Sophomore quarterback Omar Jacobs, the MAC Offensive Player of the Year, will lead BGSU into the GMAC Bowl, now in its sixth year. Miami defeated Louisville in last year’s game, 49-28, and three years ago, Marshall rallied from a 30-point deficit for a 64-61, double-overtime win over East Carolina in the highest scoring game in college football bowl history.