Insight Bowl

The Insight Bowl is a college football postseason game played at Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe, Ariz., each year. Previously known as the Copper Bowl and first contested in 1989, the Insight Bowl now matches up bowl-eligible teams from the Big 12 and Big Ten conferences. Oklahoma won the 2011 Insight Bowl, defeating defending champion Iowa.

The origins of the Insight Bowl date back to 1989, when the game was known as the Copper Bowl. The inaugural game was held on New Year's Eve in Arizona Stadium in Tucson, Ariz., where the local favorites, the Arizona Wildcats, registered a 17-10 victory over North Carolina State.

Teams from the Pac-10 Conference won three of the first four games in Copper Bowl history, with California taking the 1990 edition and Washington State claiming victory in 1992. Other conference to feature in the early years of the Copper Bowl included the Big 12 and the Western Athletic Conference, which entered into an agreement for its teams to appear in the game in Tucson during the 1990s.

The name of the game was officially changed to the Insight.com Bowl in 1997, after Insight Enterprises took over as title sponsor. The game's venue then moved to Chase Field in Phoenix three years later, when Iowa State topped Pittsburgh in the 2000 Insight Bowl.

Syracuse eased past Kansas State, 26-3, to win the 2001 game, when its name was shortened to the Insight Bowl. The decade would go on to see a number of Pac-10 versus Big East matchups, with both California (in 2003) and Arizona State (in 2005) winning battles over eastern opponents.

Arizona State's home field -- Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe, Ariz. -- became host site for the Insight Bowl the following season, when Texas Tech edged Minnesota 44-41 in overtime. Trailing 38-7 midway through the third period of that game, the Red Raiders scored 31 points in the final 20 minutes of regulation before winnig in overtime to record the largest comeback win in NCAA bowl history.

The 2006 game marked the beginning of an agreement for Big Ten and Big 12 teams to annually meet in the Insight Bowl, and Minnesota has been on the losing end two more times since, in 2008 and 2009, at Sun Devil Stadium.

In 2010, the Iowa Hawkeyes became the second consecutive team from the state of Iowa to win the bowl, following Iowa State's win in 2009. The Hawkeyes returned in 2011, falling to Oklahoma, which was making its first appearance in the game since 1994.

Sun Devil Stadium is an outdoor football and multi-purpose arena located in Tempe, Ariz., that is home to Arizona State's football team. Also home to the annual Insight Bowl each December, Sun Devil Stadium has played host to five Tostitos Fiesta Bowl national championship games and was the site of Super Bowl XXX in January 1996.

Opened in 1958 with a seating capacity of 30,000, Sun Devil Stadium has undergone various renovation upgrades over the years that have increased its capacity to more than 70,000 and modernized lighting, sound and structural systems. A new playing surface for the stadium's field was installed in 1992, while other recent upgrades have included the addition of luxury boxes as well as the Carson Student Athlete Center (at one end of the arena) that houses Arizona State's athletic department.

Sun Devil Stadium served as home to the Phoenix (now Arizona) Cardinals of the National Football League from 1988 to 2005, and was the site of the annual Fiesta Bowl from 1971 to 2006, before that game moved to the neighboring University of Phoenix Stadium. Many top musical acts have played over the years at Sun Devil Stadium, which also hosted Pope John Paul II during his papal visit to the United States in 1987.