Conference USA Says Farewell to the Hawai'i Bowl After Over Two Decades

One of Bowl Season’s prevailing tie-ins appears to be officially over. The PAC-12 quietly confirmed its 2026 bowl lineup. Amid the convolution and addition of the Poinsettia Bowl, there is one notable change.

The PAC-12’s six new members will have a tie-in to the Hawai’i Bowl against a Mountain West school. The move makes sense. A trip to the islands is more cost-effective for all parties. However, it marks the end of an era for the bowl and Conference USA.

Conference USA, and not the Mountain West or WAC, has the most appearances in the Hawai’i Bowl, with 13. The conference was the frequent road team for the college football postseason’s island showcase. Despite this, the conference grew apathetic towards the bowl. Conference USA vacated its tie-in in 2024, allowing ESPN to select USF instead..

The Conference USA partnership with the Hawai’i Bowl transcended several membership changes. Of the 30 schools to play football in Conference USA since 2002, 11 schools played in the Hawai’i Bowl during their membership in the conference. This number does not include former members Cincinnati, Memphis (invited to the 2021 edition, but it was canceled due to COVID-19), and USF, who appeared in the game as American Conference schools.

Either way, it is difficult to write the history of the Hawai’i Bowl without Conference USA. The game was a destination game in every sense of the term.

Although not a major cause, conference realignment made participation in the Hawai’i Bowl more difficult to justify. As Conference USA sprawled from its original southern-heavy footprint to one that stretched from Newark, Delaware to Las Cruces, there was not enough value in sending a team to the islands when ESPN Events could place a school in a closer bowl game. The 2024 game implied that the bowl game was no longer beneficial to Cofnerence USA.

Sure, the Hawai’i Bowl is not as historic as other bowl games, but it had something most bowl games lack these days: a consistent tie-in. As ESPN Events shuffles conferences around the games it owns, it has become much more difficult to associate conferences with specific bowls, especially in the Group of Six. Only the five non-ESPN-owned Group of Five bowls can truly associate themselves with a set pair of conferences.

The association with a recognizable, standalone spot benefitted Conference USA. In most years, college football fans could count on Conference USA playing on Christmas Eve. Now, that easy brand recognition is gone.

On a more philosophical level, the move points to the declining value of playing in Hawai’i. The Hawai’i Bowl was always an expensive endeavor, but rewarding for many players. Schools got an extra television appearance, and college students got a free trip to Hawai’i. What conference wouldn’t want a piece of that?

Now, swapping Conference USA for the PAC-12 is a move for convenience. There is a legitimate argument against the utility of the Hawai’i Bowl in years that the Warriors are not bowl-eligible. Associating the new PAC-12 with the Hawai’i Bowl creates a mutually beneficial agreement. The Hawai’i Bowl has a closer opponent for the Mountain West, and the PAC-12 gets a much-needed third bowl tie-in. Nevertheless, the years of tradition left behind in the Conference USA agreement should not be overlooked.