Little Caesars Pizza Bowl Takes Center Stage as Vikings and Eagles Game is Postponed

Put your remote down...there is no Sunday Night Football tonight as the Minnesota Vikings and Philadelphia Eagles game has been postponed; you will need to tune into the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl to get your football fix.

Because of the blizzard blanketing the mid-Atlantic states, the Eagles and Vikings game, which was originally scheduled for tonight in Philadelphia, has been postponed until Tuesday night. This will provide an unexpected, and welcome, benefit to the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl, which was formerly known as the Motor City Bowl.

While a bowl such as the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl would normally take a distant back seat to an NFL game, tonight it will get an unexpected bump in ratings and attention. Florida International, whose football program is only in its ninth season of existence, will meet Toledo at Ford Field in Detroit. The game will be shown on ESPN, starting at 8:30 pm ET.

While it is not a BCS Bowl, the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl does not lack for a storyline. For Florida International's young program, 2010 was really their breakout season, as they went 6 and 6 overall and 6 and 2 in the Sun Belt Conference.

For Toledo, this is the first appearance in a bowl since 2005, when they won the GMAC Bowl. They have a new head coach this season. Tim Beckman took over as head coach last year and has seemingly turned the program around.

Talking about their appearance in the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl, Beckman said, ""Playing in the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl is a great reward for our players, especially the seniors, who have worked very hard this season and are deserving of a bowl of this stature and reputation. We also look forward to playing a very tough FIU team, with whom many of our players and coaches are very familiar, having played them in 2008 and 2009."

The problem with many college football bowl games that are not top tier bowls is that they really don't decide or prove anything. Few will remember, even a week from now, who won the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl; most will be focused on the NFL playoff scenarios. On the college level, the focus will be on bowls such as the Fiesta Bowl and then the national championship game between Oregon and Auburn.

Tonight, though, as a good chunk of the country is snowbound and as the Sunday Night Football game between the Vikings and Eagles is postponed, there will be a few hours devoted to the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl and two upstart programs in Toledo and Florida International.

Source:

http://scores.espn.go.com/ncf/preview?gameId=303602649
http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=5956740