The Holiday Bowl won't be played in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic

There will be no Holiday Bowl in 2020.

The bowl announced Thursday that the game would not be played for the first time in over 40 years. The Holiday Bowl has been an annual game since 1978.

The bowl has pitted Big Ten and Pac-12 teams for the past six seasons and was set to feature ACC and Pac-12 teams. The 2020 season was going to be the first year for the Holiday Bowl’s ACC tie-in. The WAC and the Big 12 have also had tie-ins to the San Diego-based bowl game.

“The Pac-12 shares in the Holiday Bowl’s disappointment that the current COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in the cancellation of this year’s game,” the conference said in a statement. “The Holiday Bowl is a premier and historic postseason game loved by fans across the country and we look forward to the 2021 and future editions of the game. We will continue to work with our bowl partners on our 2020 lineup.”

The Holiday Bowl’s cancellation is the fourth bowl cancellation of the 2020 season because of the coronavirus pandemic. The Redbox Bowl was the first game to cancel in 2020 and ESPN previously announced that the Hawaii Bowl and the Bahamas Bowl would not be played.

The absence of those four bowl games won’t be the only thing different about the 2020-21 bowl season. The NCAA has said that win requirements for bowl games are waived for this season because of the uncertainty of the pandemic.

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Nick Bromberg is a writer for Yahoo Sports.

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