Gasparilla Bowl geared toward celebrating pirates, college football

“We lean into our pirate-based theme,” Gasparilla Bowl executive director Scott Glaser told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “In late January our community hosts a parade that draws about 600,000 people to the Tampa Bay area. (The Gasparilla Bowl) is kind of the dress rehearsal for that.

“So come down to the Gasparilla Bowl, get dressed up, put your pirate gear on. Out in the fan area we’ll probably have 10-12 floats that are in the parade and people get dressed up like pirates and are throwing beads and getting a head start on what’s gonna take place in the new year.”

Glaser, a veteran of the college athletics industry who spent nearly two decades at the University of South Florida before becoming the Gasparilla Bowl director in 2019, said he spent much of his Sunday like the many college football, and Tech, fans did: waiting. Bowl selections and announcements traditionally come the Sunday after the conference championships are played and that news is often settled by the early afternoon of that day.

But the Jackets (6-6) truly didn’t learn their destination until around 6 p.m. Sunday. They didn’t learn their opponent until 15 minutes after that – Tech coach Brent Key even stopped mid-news conference Sunday when his mobile phone buzzed with the confirmation the Jackets would face UCF.

Glaser explained that when ACC champion and undefeated Florida State was left out of the College Football Playoff, a decision that was announced about 12:30 p.m., a trickle-down effect determined which bowls got which ACC teams.

As far as the ACC designations were concerned, Florida State to the Orange Bowl as the league champion was the only bowl slot that was automatically filled. The league’s 10 other bowl-eligible teams (as well as Notre Dame), the ACC office and the bowl games themselves then worked in conjunction to figure out the best fits and matchups across the country.

For a few hours, it had been rumored that Tech would face Troy in the Birmingham Bowl on Dec. 23. That matchup never was officially announced by the Birmingham Bowl or by Tech.

“Some of the games, like ours, it’s a little bit later in the (selection) process. We wait and see what teams are available, and then we start working with the conference office to see how we can best support the conference. That’s really what it came down to,” Glaser said. “I think it’s gonna be a great matchup. We got a team like Georgia Tech that’s just over six hours away. Then you got UCF about 90 minutes away in Orlando. So hopefully both fan bases get excited about an ACC-Big 12 matchup. It’s a game everybody wants so we’re excited.”

The Gasparilla Bowl, which originated as the St. Petersburg Bowl in 2008 and was played in St. Petersburg, Florida, at Tropicana Field, the home of the Tampa Bay Rays, has primary agreements with the SEC, ACC and American Athletic conferences (although Glaser explained the game has secondary agreements with nearly every other FBS conference to select one of their eligible teams). Tech will be only the third team representing the ACC to ever participate in the 15-year-old postseason game – Wake Forest defeated Missouri in the 2022 game and North Carolina State beat UCF (with Key on the sidelines as UCF’s offensive line coach) in 2014.

Bowl events include a block party and pep rally for both teams Dec. 21 and tailgating, live music and a fan fest at Raymond James Stadium starting three hours before kickoff.

“Having an ACC team again this year and a team like Georgia Tech and the season they’re having, starting to make their moves, we’re certainly excited to have ‘em,” Glaser added.