Rose Bowl

For years and years, the Rose Bowl fought the good fight and stayed away from commercial sponsorship. Even as its traditional New Year's Day brethren bowls -- the Orange, Sugar and Cotton -- all succumbed to the perversion of big corporate dollars, the Rose remained above the fray.That is, until yesterday, when ABC -- the Rose Bowl's telecaster and the home of the new Bowl Championship Series -- announced that it has brokered a deal to have the game's sponsorship go to AT&T."It's kind of a dream come true," said Harriman Cronk, chairman of the Tournament of Roses committee that runs the game and the parade.

Has the bloom gone off the Rose Bowl?What used to be the New Year's Day college football bowl game isn't even the game from 2 to 5:30 p.m.The annual matchup between the Big Ten and Pacific 10 champions has lost more than a third of its ratings appeal since 1983. Tuesday's game matching No. 8 Washington and No. 17 Iowa could see the ratings hit an all-time low.Keith Jackson, who will call the game for ABC, cites increased competition -- especially from NBC's Sunkist Fiesta Bowl -- for the ratings drop.

PASADENA, Calif. -- This time, for a change, the Rose Bowl is not simply the game that follows the parade. This year, it actually counts.Any time you've got the Heisman winner and the Outland winner on the field at the same time, you've got a treat that should beat some flower-covered float. Michigan's Desmond Howard ran away with the Heisman, and Washington's Steve Emtman was everyone's best lineman. And then you have two very hot, very exciting, very talented teams playing in what may be the most important Rose Bowl since Southern Cal won a piece of the national championship in 1978.

PASADENA, Calif. -- This year is something of a homecoming for the Super Bowl. It's back to where it started XXVI years ago.When the Buffalo Bills and the Dallas Cowboys meet in Super Bowl XXVII on Sunday, the site will be the Rose Bowl in Pasadena. The first one was played Jan. 15, 1967, at the Los Angeles Coliseum.The only reason the first one wasn't played at the Rose Bowl -- which has 10,000 more seats than the nearby Coliseum -- is that Rose Bowl officials wouldn't allow their hallowed stadium to be used.

PASADENA, Calif. - The rumors began in the aftermath of Nebraska's 62-36 loss at Colorado, a humiliating defeat that ended the regular season for the Cornhuskers and, it seemed, any chance of playing for a national championship. The whispers around Lincoln were that the defense's legendary Blackshirts, given to players as a symbol of excellence, had been taken away after what senior middle linebacker Jamie Burrow would call "the debacle." Though some of those hurt feelings were eased when the 11-1 Cornhuskers were given a reprieve by the Bowl Championship Series and a place in tomorrow's Rose Bowl against top-ranked Miami (11-1)

BURBANK, Calif. -- Heisman Trophy winner Charles Woodson seemed right at home in the land of stardom. He toured Universal Studios yesterday with the rest of the participants in the 84th Rose Bowl, posed for publicity shots with the dinosaurs of Jurassic Park, and enjoyed the kind of attention that has long been reserved for the guys who spend their quality time on the other side of the ball.Woodson, of course, is the first defensive player to win the Heisman, a distinction that has pushed him to the center of the college football universe.

PASADENA, Calif. - The rain was turned off for the Rose Bowl, just as it always is. It hasn't rained on the game - or the accompanying parade - in 50 years. Thus the 91st Rose Bowl woke up in sunshine, after a week of record rains, as No. 6 Texas squared off against No. 13 Michigan for the first time in the schools' long and glorious histories. And the game didn't disappoint, as Texas sophomore quarterback Vince Young and Michigan freshman quarterback Chad Henne had a Rose Bowl game for the ages that the Longhorns won, 38-37, as time expired.

PASADENA, Calif. -- The fairy-tale ride of the Northwestern Wildcats came to an end yesterday. And the players in a program that went 47 years between Rose Bowl appearances might spend at least that long wondering what went wrong when their long-awaited day in the spotlight finally arrived.In losing the 82nd Rose Bowl, 41-32, to 17th-ranked USC, the third-ranked Wildcats gave up a season-high scoring total that exceeded that of their last three opponents combined. They also committed an uncharacteristic two turnovers -- including a 53-yard fumble return by Daylon McCutcheon -- and missed two field-goal attempts.

EVANSTON, Ill. -- The script still seems far-fetched.A team that has been the Big Ten's doormat for most of the past 50 years suddenly becomes dominant. A coach who has been anonymous for much of his career suddenly becomes a household name. A school known for producing actors and academicians suddenly becomes a place for blue-chip football players.If this story had been submitted for a class in Northwestern's famed theater department, even last year, it might have been rejected as pure fantasy.

Saturday was a sad day for the bowl alliance and a happy day for the Rose Bowl.In the last cycle of its current three-year agreement, the bowl alliance is trying to match the nation's two top-ranked teams in a national-championship game. But the Big Ten and Pacific-10 conferences, which send their champions to the Rose Bowl, are not alliance members.The bowl alliance absorbed several body blows in Week 3, with the Big 12 Conference serving as the main victim. Teams from the Big Ten and Pac-10 recorded impressive and shocking victories at home and on the road.