The Ohio State Buckeyes football team competes as part of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), representing the Ohio State University in the Big Ten Conference. Since the establishment of the football program in 1890, the Buckeyes have played in 58 bowl games. [1] [2] Included in these games are 34 appearances in the "big four" bowl games (the Rose, Sugar, Orange, and Fiesta), including one national championship victory in the 2003 Fiesta Bowl, two appearances in the BCS National Championship Game, and three appearances in the College Football Playoff National Championship, including two national championship victories in the 2015 College Football Playoff National Championship and the 2025 College Football Playoff National Championship.
Ohio State's first bowl game came during the 1920 season when, under the leadership of eighth year head coach John Wilce, the team went on to the Rose Bowl where they would be defeated by California 28–0. [3] Following their first Rose Bowl appearance, the school would not make another bowl appearance until 1949, when head coach Wes Fesler led the Buckeyes to the Rose Bowl again, this time defeating the California Golden Bears 17–14. [4] Following Fesler, Woody Hayes took over the position of head coach at Ohio State and during his career would lead the Buckeyes to eleven bowl games and compiling a 5–6 record. The Buckeyes appeared in the Rose Bowl eight times during Hayes' tenure and would go 4–4 in those games. Hayes would also lead the Buckeyes to one Orange Bowl, one Sugar Bowl, and one Gator Bowl appearance during his time as head coach. [1]
Earle Bruce became the head coach of the Ohio State Buckeyes following Woody Hayes in 1979. Bruce would lead the Buckeyes to the Rose Bowl in his first season, coming one point away from a national championship, losing to the USC Trojans 17–16. [5] Over Bruce's career, the Buckeyes would make eight bowl appearances going 5–3 in those games. Ohio State also made two Rose Bowl appearances under Bruce, in which the team went 0–2. Following Bruce, John Cooper became the head coach of the Buckeyes and would lead the school to ten bowl appearances, including one Rose Bowl victory in 1997, the school's first Rose Bowl victory since 1974. [6] [7] Cooper would lead the Buckeyes to a 3–8 bowl record during his tenure. Cooper would also lead the Buckeyes to the Sugar Bowl in 1999, the first Bowl Championship Series appearance for Ohio State.
Jim Tressel was hired as the head coach of the Buckeyes in 2001 and would remain head coach at the university until 2010. Under Tressel, Ohio State made a bowl appearance in all his ten seasons as head coach and made eight BCS bowl appearances for a total of nine appearances for the university, the most of any other school. [1] [8] Tressel would also lead the Buckeyes to the national championship game in 2002, where the Buckeyes defeated the Miami Hurricanes 31–24 in double overtime for their first national championship since 1970. [9] Tressel compiled an overall bowl record of 5–4 with one vacated victory, including three appearances in the BCS National Championship Game, four appearances in the Fiesta Bowl, one in the Rose Bowl, one in the Sugar Bowl, one in the Outback Bowl, and one in the Alamo Bowl. Ohio State would also reach the Gator Bowl in 2011 under head coach Luke Fickell, which they would lose 24–17 to the Florida Gators.
In November 2011, Urban Meyer was hired as the head coach and has led the Buckeyes to bowl games in five seasons during his time at Ohio State. Meyer led the Buckeyes to their tenth BCS bowl against Clemson in the Orange Bowl. In 2014, Meyer led the Buckeyes to the inaugural College Football Playoff, where the Buckeyes defeated Alabama in the Sugar Bowl and Oregon in the College Football Playoff National Championship, to win the program's eighth national championship. In their 2015–16 bowl appearance, Ohio State defeated Notre Dame in the Fiesta Bowl. The win in that game brought Ohio State's overall bowl record to 22 wins and 24 losses. Meyer also led the Buckeyes to the 4th seed in the college football playoffs in the 2016–17 season. The Buckeyes fell to Clemson in that game 31–0. During the 2017–18 season, the Buckeyes played in the 2017 Cotton Bowl Classic, where they defeated the USC Trojans 24–7. Ohio State would play the following year in the 2019 Rose Bowl. It would be Ohio State's 15th Rose Bowl appearance and final bowl game for coach Urban Meyer. The Buckeyes would go on to defeat Pac-12 champion Washington 28–23. Starting in 2024, the College Football Playoff expanded to 12 teams, with first round games behind played at campus stadiums.
As of December 2024, Ohio State has said they will not count CFP First Round games as bowl game appearances. [10]
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Bowl | App. | Wins | Losses | Win Pct. | Most Recent Result |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Rose Bowl | 17 | 10 | 7 | .588 | W 41–21 vs. Oregon (2024) |
Fiesta Bowl | 9 | 5 | 4 | .556 | L 23–29 vs. Clemson (2019) |
Sugar Bowl | 6 | 4 | 2 | .667 | W 49–28 vs. Clemson (2021) |
Citrus Bowl | 4 | 1 | 3 | .250 | L 14–20 vs. Tennessee (1995) |
ReliaQuest Bowl b | 4 | 0 | 4 | .000 | L 28–31 vs. South Carolina (2002) |
Cotton Bowl | 4 | 3 | 1 | .750 | W 28–14 vs. Texas (2024) |
CFP National Championship Game | 3 | 2 | 1 | .667 | W 34-23 vs. Notre Dame (2024) |
BCS National Championship Game | 3 | 1 | 2 | .333 | L 24–38 vs. LSU (2008) |
Holiday Bowl | 2 | 2 | 0 | 1.000 | W 28–21 vs. BYU (1993) |
Orange Bowl | 2 | 1 | 1 | .500 | L 35–40 vs. Clemson (2014) |
Liberty Bowl | 2 | 1 | 1 | .500 | L 11–23 vs. Air Force (1990) |
Gator Bowl a | 2 | 0 | 2 | .000 | L 17–24 vs. Florida (2012) |
Alamo Bowl | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1.000 | W 33–7 vs. Oklahoma State (2004) |
Peach Bowl | 1 | 0 | 1 | .000 | L 41-42 vs Georgia (2022) |
a The Gator Bowl was formerly called the TaxSlayer Bowl b The ReliaQuest Bowl was formerly called the Outback Bowl and Hall of Fame Bowl
Bowl Selector | App. | Wins | Losses | Win Pct. | Most Recent Result |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
College Football Playoff | 11 | 7 | 4 | .636 | W 34-23 vs. Notre Dame (2025 CFP National Championship Game) |
New Years Six | 10 | 7 | 3 | .700 | W 48-45 vs. Utah (2022 Rose Bowl) |
Bowl Championship Series | 10 | 6* | 4 | .556 | L 35–40 vs. Clemson (2014 Orange Bowl) |
Bowl Alliance | 1 | 0 | 1 | .000 | L 14–31 vs. Florida State (1998 Sugar Bowl) |
The Bowl Championship Series (BCS) was a college football post-season selection system that created four or five bowl game match-ups involving eight or ten of the top ranked teams in the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) of American college football, including an opportunity for the top two teams to compete in a national championship game. The system was in place from the 1998 season to the 2013 season and was replaced in 2014 by the College Football Playoff (CFP).
Urban Frank Meyer III is an American sportscaster and former college football coach. He spent most of his coaching career at the collegiate level, having served as the head coach of the Bowling Green Falcons from 2001 to 2002, the Utah Utes from 2003 to 2004, the Florida Gators from 2005 to 2010, and the Ohio State Buckeyes from 2012 to 2018. He retired from coaching in 2019 at the end of the Rose Bowl, and stayed at Ohio State as an assistant athletic director and was also an analyst for Fox Sports, appearing weekly on their Big Noon Kickoff pregame show. In 2021, Meyer came out of retirement to take his first National Football League (NFL) job as head coach of the Jacksonville Jaguars, but was fired 13 games into his first and only season, after going 2–11 and being involved in both on- and off-field controversies. He then went back to Fox Sports to resume his broadcasting career.
James Patrick Tressel is an American college football coach and university administrator who served as president of Youngstown State University in Youngstown, Ohio from 2014 to 2023. Before becoming an administrator, Tressel was the head football coach of the Youngstown State Penguins and later the Ohio State Buckeyes in a career that spanned from 1986 until 2010. Tressel's teams earned several national championships during the course of his career, earning him numerous accolades.
The BCS National Championship Game, or BCS National Championship, was a postseason college football bowl game, used to determine a national champion of the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), first played in the 1998 college football season as one of four designated bowl games, and beginning in the 2006 season as a standalone event rotated among the host sites of the aforementioned bowls.
The 2002 NCAA Division I-A football season ended with a double overtime national championship game. Ohio State and Miami both came into the Fiesta Bowl undefeated. The underdog Buckeyes defeated the defending-champion Hurricanes 31–24, ending Miami's 34-game winning streak. Jim Tressel won the national championship in only his second year as head coach.
The Ohio State Buckeyes football team competes as part of the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision, representing Ohio State University in the Big Ten Conference. Ohio State has played its home games at Ohio Stadium in Columbus, Ohio, since 1922.
The 2007 Tostitos BCS National Championship Game was an American football game played at the University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, on January 8, 2007, and featured the top-ranked Big Ten champion Ohio State Buckeyes against the 2nd-ranked SEC champion Florida Gators. The Gators routed the Buckeyes by a final score of 41–14 to win their first national championship since 1996.
The 2005 Tostitos Fiesta Bowl, played on January 1, 2005, was the 34th edition of the Fiesta Bowl. The game was played between Utah and Pittsburgh, in front of 73,519 fans. It is notable for being the first BCS game to feature a team from a BCS non-AQ conference.
The history of Ohio State Buckeyes football covers 125 years through the 2014 season. The team has represented the Ohio State University in the Western Conference, its successor the Big Ten, and in the NCAA Division I. Its history parallels the development of college football as a major sport in the United States and demonstrates the status of the Buckeyes as one of its major programs.
The 2003 FedEx Orange Bowl was the 69th edition of the college football bowl game, played at Pro Player Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida, on Thursday, January 2. It matched the third-ranked Iowa Hawkeyes of the Big Ten Conference and the USC Trojans of the Pacific-10 Conference. Tied at halftime, favored USC pulled away in the second half to win, 38–17.
The Bowl Championship Series (BCS) was a selection system used between 1998 and 2013 that replaced the previously similarly more controversial Bowl Coalition and Bowl Alliance that was used between 1992 and 1997 and was replaced by the College Football Playoff in 2014. The selection system was designed, through polls and computer statistics, to determine a No. 1 and No. 2 ranked team in the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). After the final polls, the two top teams were chosen to play in the BCS National Championship Game which determined the BCS national champion team, but not the champion team for independent voting systems. This format was intended to be "bowl-centered" rather than a traditional playoff system, since numerous FBS Conferences had expressed their unwillingness to participate in a play-off system. However, due to the unique and often esoteric nature of the BCS format, there had been controversy as to which two teams should play for the national championship and which teams should play in the four other BCS bowl games. In this selection process, the BCS was often criticized for conference favoritism, its inequality of access for teams in non-Automatic Qualifying (non-AQ) Conferences, and perceived monopolistic, "profit-centered" motives. In terms of this last concern, Congress explored the possibility on more than one occasion of holding hearings to determine the legality of the BCS under the terms of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, and the United States Justice Department also periodically announced interest in investigating the BCS for similar reasons.
The 2009 Tostitos Fiesta Bowl game was a post-season college football bowl game between the Ohio State Buckeyes and the Texas Longhorns on Monday, January 5, 2009, at University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Arizona. Texas participated in the Fiesta Bowl because the Big 12 champion University of Oklahoma Sooners were participating in the 2009 BCS National Championship Game; however the bowl kept its ties to the Big 12 by selecting the Longhorns, who did not play in the championship game as they beat Oklahoma in the Red River Rivalry, 45–35, then lost to Texas Tech and Texas Tech in turn lost to Oklahoma and dictated that a tiebreaker would decide that the highest BCS ranked team for the Big 12 South the week of November 28, 2008, would be in the title game. The Buckeyes were chosen as an at-large school as co-champions of the Big Ten Conference, having lost the right to play in the Rose Bowl due to a 13–6 loss to Penn State on October 25.
The 2011 Allstate Sugar Bowl was an American college football bowl game that was part of the Bowl Championship Series (BCS) for the 2010 NCAA Division I FBS football season and was the 77th Sugar Bowl. The contest took place on January 4, 2011, in the Louisiana Superdome in New Orleans, Louisiana. The game had an 8 p.m. (ET) kickoff. Paul Hoolahan was the executive director.
Luke Joseph Fickell is an American college football coach and former player. He is the head football coach for the University of Wisconsin–Madison, a position he has held since 2023. Previously he was the head coach at the University of Cincinnati, a position he held from 2016 through 2022. Fickell played college football as a nose guard at Ohio State University from 1993 to 1996 and then was an assistant coach for the Buckeyes. He was interim head coach at Ohio State for the entire 2011 season.
The 2012 TaxSlayer.com Gator Bowl, the 67th edition of the game, was a post-season American college football bowl game, held on January 2, 2012 at EverBank Field in Jacksonville, Florida as part of the 2011–12 NCAA Bowl season. TaxSlayer.com was named the corporate title sponsor on September 1, 2011. The game, which was telecasted at 1:00 p.m. ET on ESPN2, featured the Ohio State Buckeyes of the Big Ten Conference versus the Florida Gators of the Southeastern Conference.
The 2015 College Football Playoff National Championship was a college football bowl game played on January 12, 2015, at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas. The inaugural College Football Playoff National Championship, which replaced the BCS National Championship Game, the game determined a national champion of the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) for the 2014 season. Aside from the all-star games following after, this was the culminating game of the 2014–15 bowl season. Sponsored by telecommunications company AT&T, the game was officially known as the 2015 College Football Playoff National Championship presented by AT&T. The national title was contested through a four-team bracket system, the College Football Playoff, which replaced the previous Bowl Championship Series.