GoDaddy.com Bowl

The GoDaddy.com Bowl is a college football bowl game that is played in Mobile, Ala., each year. Operating since 1999, the bowl was known for 10 years as the GMAC Bowl. This season, it has tie-ins with the Sun Belt and Mid-American conferences. For the past several years, it has been held in January as one of the last non-BCS games held each postseason.

Northern Illinois won the 2012 GoDaddy.com Bowl, defeating Arkansas State.

The bowl was formed in 1999 as the Mobile Alabama Bowl, a showcase for the Mid-American Conference against Conference USA. The first game took place Dec. 22, 1999, when a LaDainian Tomlinson-led TCU upset East Carolina.

GMAC signed on as a title sponsor in 2001, and one of the most memorable editions of the bowl took place that year. Marshall took on East Carolina in a two-overtime duel that ended 64-61 to the Thundering Herd. At the time, it was the highest-scoring bowl game of all time, and Marshall's comeback was the largest in bowl history (it had been down 38-8). Byron Leftwich was the quarterback for the Herd in that game and had 576 yards. He won the MVP that year and the next, as Marshall repeated as GMAC champion in 2002.

Ben Roethlisberger took his Miami (Ohio) team to the GMAC title in 2003, joining a line of future professionals who had been featured in the bowl (and won MVP) since it began in 1999. From 2000 through '03, the winners were Tomlinson, Leftwich twice and Roethlisberger.

In 2007, the bowl moved from its traditional late-December date for the first time. The bowl was played Jan. 7 that year, the day before the BCS National Championship Game. That trend was repeated in 2008, when Tulsa set a new record for scoring differential by beating Bowling Green 63-7.

The bowl has continued to be played late in the postseason. GoDaddy.com became the bowl's title sponsor in 2010. The first GoDaddy.com Bowl was played Jan. 6, 2011.

The bowl has garnered a reputation as being extremely high-scoring -- its average point total over its 12 years is more than 66 points, and teams have scored at least 70 combined points five times. That total also includes two double-overtime games.