Rebel Football Bowl History
Ed Walker coached the first Ole Miss bowl team, the high-scoring outfit of 1935 which out-played, but was nipped by Catholic University, 20-19, in the 1936 Orange Bowl. The next bowl for the Rebels was for the 1947 squad, a 12-year wait. But from there, with Coach John Howard Vaught at the Ole Miss helm, bowls came and kept coming after the Rebels following each season. Vaught took the Rebs to the ill-fated Delta Bowl in 1948, as the 1947 SEC Champions beat Texas Christian 13-9. Vaught had to wait until 1952 to go bowling again, but from that point forward, the Rebel mentor made post-season games a habit that was hard to break. All-in-all, the Rebels participated in six Sugar Bowls, two Gators, one Cotton, two Bluebonnets, two Liberties, one Sun and one Peach during that run of 15 straight. Vaught's personal bowl record was 10-8, while Billy Kinard's 1971 Rebels, with a 9-2 record, earned a bid to play Georgia Tech in the Peach Bowl, which produced a 41-18 triumph. Ole Miss dropped out of the bowl picture after that 1971 Peach Bowl appearance with Georgia Tech. When Billy Brewer became head coach prior to the 1983 season, the Rebels had not been bowling for 12 years. During Brewer's 11 years as head coach, Ole Miss went to five bowls, twice to the Independence, twice to the Liberty, and once to the Gator. Brewer was 3-2 as a coach in bowl games. The Rebels returned to postseason action in 1997 for the first time since the 1992 Liberty Bowl, and for the first time under Tommy Tuberville, as Ole Miss was invited to the inaugural Ford Motor City Bowl in Pontiac, Mich. Played in front of a crowd of over 43,000 at the Pontiac Silverdome, freshman running back Deuce McAllister scored on a one-yard plunge with 31 seconds left to play to lift Ole Miss to a 34-31 win over the Marshall Thundering Herd in one of the most exciting bowl games of the 1997 postseason. The Rebels then followed with what was probably the biggest upset of the 1998 bowl season, as Ole Miss defeated heavily-favored Texas Tech, 35-18 in the Sanford Independence Bowl in head coach David Cutcliffe's debut. Cutcliffe and Ole Miss returned to the Independence Bowl again in 1999, where it defeated Oklahoma 27-25, to win its third consecutive bowl game in three years. Ole Miss went to its fourth-straight bowl in 2000, but fell to West Virginia 49-38 in the Music City Bowl. Cutcliffe then went to 3-0 in the Independence Bowl in 2002 when the Rebels defeated Nebraska 27-23. He won his fourth bowl game with a 31-28 win over Oklahoma State in the Cotton Bowl. Ole Miss has returned to bowl glory under head coach Houston Nutt, who led the Rebels to Cotton Bowl victories in each of his first two seasons.
Outstanding Player Awards SUGAR BOWL COTTON BOWL PEACH BOWL INDEPENDENCE BOWL GATOR BOWL BLUEBONNET BOWL LIBERTY BOWL MOTOR CITY BOWL |
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