Baylor Bears football

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The Baylor Bears football team represents Baylor University in Division I FBS college football. They are a member of the Big 12 Conference. The team plays its home games at Floyd Casey Stadium in Waco, Texas.

History

Baylor University's football team has seen a wide variation in its success through the years, from a 3–0 record in 1900 to a 0–10 record in 1969. Baylor has many traditions such as the Battle of the Brazos rivalry, the world's first homecoming in 1909, neutral site games at The State Fair of Texas, membership in the historic Southwest Conference, a live bear mascot since 1915 and the Baylor Line. Baylor won the SWC Championship in 1922 and then again in 1924. In 1956 Baylor came close to the SWC title again but came in second and was sent to face the #2 Tennessee Volunteers in the 1957 Sugar Bowl. Baylor defeated Johnny Majors and the #2 Volunteers 13-7. This remains the highest ranked opponent Baylor has ever defeated. The 1924 SWC Championship would be the last for 50 years until Baylor won it all again in 1974 under the leadership of third year head coach Grant Teaff--who was named national coach of the year that year. Teaff would go on to serve until 1992 leading Baylor to 8 bowl games and two conference chamionships (1974, 1980) in his 21 years as coach.

Miracle on the Brazos

The 1974 SWC Championship season was the most memorable in school history. Baylor had finished in last place in 1973 and had not won the conference in 50 years. Furthermore, coming into the '74 season Baylor had lost 16 consecutive seasons to the University of Texas Longhorns. BU not only won the conference title but defeated the Longhorns, which marked the first time in seven seasons that Texas did not win the SWC. The '74 BU season is dubbed the "Miracle on the Brazos".

Recent history

2008 Season

The 2008 season was highlighted by a non-conference win over Washington State (who finished the season 2-11), a win over rival Texas A&M and a 5th-place (of 6 competing) conference finish.

2009 season

The 2009 season was highlighted by a non-conference road win against Wake Forest, a road win against two-time Big 12 North defending champions Missouri, two games televised on ABC and a neutral site battle with rival Texas Tech at Cowboys Stadium (a 20-13 loss).

2010 season

The 2010 season features a road game against rival TCU (AP #4) and a battle against rival Texas Tech at the State Fair of Texas in the Cotton Bowl. On Sunday, October 24, 2010, the Baylor Bears appeared in the BCS rankings at #25. This marked the first time Baylor being ranked since 1993. Unfortunately Baylor quickly dropped back out of the top twenty-five after suffering a blow-out loss to Oklahoma State. Baylor followed this loss with home losses to both Texas A&M and Oklahoma, leaving Baylor with a 7-5 regular season record, along with a 4-4 conference record placing them in the lower half of the Big XII South Division standings, but 6th in the Big XII.^[1]

Championships

Baylor has 5 Southwest Conference championships.^[2] Baylor also won the 1915 Southwest Conference championship, but the title was forfeited voluntarily after Baylor discovered that a transfer player was ineligible to have played.

Year	Overall Record	Conference Record	Coach	Conference
1922	8-3-0	5-0-0	Frank Bridges	Southwest Conference
1924	7-2-1	4-0-1	Frank Bridges	Southwest Conference
1974	8-4-0	6-1-0	Grant Teaff	Southwest Conference
1980	10-2-0	8-0-0	Grant Teaff	Southwest Conference
1994†	7-5-0	4-3-0	Chuck Reedy	Southwest Conference

† Denotes shared title.

Bowl Games

Baylor has appeared in 5 New Year's Day bowl games and 5 major bowl games.

Season	Date	Bowl	Opponent	Result
1948	January 1, 1949	Dixie Bowl	Wake Forest	W 20-7
1951	January 1, 1952	Orange Bowl	Georgia Tech	L 14-17
1954	December 31, 1954	Gator Bowl	Auburn	L 13-33
1956	January 1, 1957	Sugar Bowl	Tennessee	W 13-7
1960	December 31, 1960	Gator Bowl	Florida	W 13-12
1961	December 9, 1961	Gotham Bowl	Utah State	W 24-9
1963	December 31, 1963	Bluebonnet Bowl	LSU	W 14-7
1974	January 1, 1975	Cotton Bowl Classic	Penn State	L 41-20
1979	December 31, 1979	Peach Bowl	Clemson	W 24-18
1980	January 1, 1981	Cotton Bowl Classic	Alabama	L 30-2
1983	December 31, 1983	Bluebonnet Bowl	Oklahoma State	L 14-24
1985	December 27, 1985	Liberty Bowl	LSU	W 21-7
1986	December 31, 1986	Bluebonnet Bowl	Colorado	W 21-9
1991	December 31, 1991	Copper Bowl	Indiana	L 0-24
1992	December 31, 1992	Sun Bowl	Arizona	W 20-15
1994	December 31, 1994	Alamo Bowl	Washington State	L 3-10
2010	December 29, 2010	Texas Bowl	Illinois	L 14-38

College Football Hall of Famers

Two Baylor coaches and six Baylor players have been inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.

Morley Jennings - Head Coach (1926–1940)
Barton Koch - G (1927–1930)
Hayden Fry - QB (1947–1950)
Jim Ray Smith - T (1950–1953)
Bill Glass - DE (1954–1956)
Larry Elkins - WR (1963–1964)
Grant Teaff - Head Coach (1972–1992)
Mike Singletary - LB (1977–1980)
Thomas Everett - FS (1985–1987)

Rivalries

Texas A&M

Texas A&M is one of Baylor's rival as the series dates from 1899 and the two schools are located 90 miles apart on the Brazos River. Texas A&M holds a 67-21-9 lead in football victories in the Battle of the Brazos. A significant number of those victories were earned during the Jackie Sherrill and RC Slocum eras, during which A&M was cited twice for "lack of institutional control" and "unethical conduct" causing the program to be put on probation and receive a two year post-season ban.

Texas

Dating back to 1901, the series is 73-22-4 in favor of Texas. Texas had won 12 in a row (and 16 of 17) in the series until 2010, when Baylor upset the Longhorns in Austin.

Texas Tech

KDawson2004 — Baylor Bears and Texas Tech Red Raiders in action in 2004

Along with Texas A&M, the Baylor Bears are Texas Tech's most played opponent with 68 meetings between the teams. Dating back to 1929, the series is 35-32-1 in favor of Texas Tech. Tech has won 14 in a row in the series. Since 2009, the Bears have played Texas Tech on a neutral field the Saturday after Thanksgiving (with the exception of the 2010 game which was played at the Cotton Bowl during the State Fair of Texas). The series between the Bears and Red Raiders will continue to be played on Thanksgiving Weekend.^[3]

TCU

Baylor's rivalry with TCU is one of the most played in college football. Dating back to 1899, TCU leads the series 50-49-7. The series began while TCU was located in Waco, Texas as a cross-town rivalry with Baylor. Due to their close proximity, twenty-three games were played between 1899 and 1910. A fire in 1910 destroyed the Main Building on the TCU campus and financial incentives from the city of Fort Worth convinced the Board of Trustees to relocate the university to that city. There was a ten year break in the series when the dissolution of the Southwest Conference in 1995 resulted in the two universities joining separate athletic conferences. The series resumed in Waco for the 2006 home opener with subsequent games being played in 2007 and 2010.