The Outback Bowl

Over the holiday break from school, a few Kennedy students traveled south to cheer on the University of Iowa Hawkeyes football team in the Outback Bowl. I was fortunate enough to tag along with a friend to the game.

The University of Iowa Hawkeyes took on the Louisiana State University Tigers in the Outback Bowl that was held in Tampa Bay Florida on January 1, 2014. The game was played at Raymond James Stadium before a crowd of 51,296 fans.

The LSU Tigers won the game 21-14 but not without a fight. It stunk! If Iowa would’ve pulled it together in the first half we would’ve beat them!

Even though the Hawkeyes didn’t pull out the victory, the fans sure did. The University of Iowa sold 95 percent of their allotted ticket sales. This was more than any other college in a bowl game. This is amazing to me!

Louisiana is a heck of a lot closer to Florida than Iowa is. I will say though, going to the Iowa games over the years, Iowa football fans are pretty loyal to their team.

 

During the week of the bowl game there were many activities in order to get the teams and fans pumped up for the game.

There was the Outback Bowl Beach Party at Clearwater beach which hosted a battle of the bands and cheerleaders from both schools. There was also a New Year’s Eve Parade and Pep Rally. The parade had fifteen marching bands including the Hawkeyes and LSU bands.

Also the University of Iowa hosted an event called the “Hawkeye Huddle”, which was held on New Year’s Eve and featured a party for Iowa fans and had many televisions set up for fans to watch the Iowa Men’s Basketball team play. They had a huge TV, it was pretty cool to be around all those Iowa fans when watching the game!

This was a great experience for me despite Iowa loosing.

Some information on this can be found here:

http://www.outbackbowl.com/

If you are ever thinking about attending a Bowl game I wouldn’t hesitate to go!