The Big Ten and Pac-12 on Monday announced six-year agreements with the Holiday Bowl and Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl that will run from the 2014-19 seasons.
The Pac-12 will continue its tie-ins with the bowl games, while the Big Ten adds the two California contests to its future lineup. Coupled with the traditional Rose Bowl matchup in Pasadena, the Big Ten and Pac-12 will have three postseason meetings in California in most seasons.
The Holiday Bowl will continue to have the third selection of Pac-12 teams after the Rose and Alamo bowls, while the Kraft Fight Hunger moves up to the No. 4 Pac-12 selection.
The Big Ten will employ a tiered system with its future bowl lineup, slotting games and teams into specific tiers. The league and the bowls will work together to make selections, and at least five different Big Ten teams will appear in both the Holiday and Kraft Fight Hunger bowls during the six-year agreement. The Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl moves to Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif., beginning in 2014.
The Big Ten already has added the Pinstripe Bowl in New York to its future lineup with an eight-year agreement. It will face ACC opponents at Yankee Stadium for at least the first six years of the deal.
The Big Ten had a tie-in with the Holiday Bowl from 1992-94 and sent six other teams to the San Diego-based games from 1979-91. The Big Ten sent Illinois to the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl as an at-large selection in 2011.
The league also is expected to add the Music City Bowl in Nashville, the Armed Forces Bowl in Fort Worth, Texas, a new Detroit bowl game to be managed by the Detroit Lions and possibly another East Coast game to its lineup, sources told ESPN. The Music City Bowl will share a tie-in with the Gator Bowl, a current Big Ten tie-in, during the six-year tie-in, sources told ESPN's Brett McMurphy. The Armed Forces Bowl will share a tie-in with the Heart of Dallas during the six-year tie-in, a source said.
The Big Ten is expected to continue agreements with the Capital One and Outback bowls in Florida, while the Meineke Car Care Bowl of Texas and the Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl will leave the lineup. Big Ten teams also will make at least three appearances in the Orange Bowl from 2014-26. In those seasons, the ACC will take the Big Ten's spot in the Capital One Bowl, sources told McMurphy.