The Tony the Tiger Sun Bowl, which has been played every year since its inception in 1935, has been canceled because of the coronavirus pandemic, sources confirmed to ESPN on Tuesday.
An official announcement is expected on Tuesday. Stadium first reported the Sun Bowl’s pending announcement.
The game was scheduled for the Sun Bowl in El Paso, Texas, on Dec. 31.
El Paso has been dealing with a COVID-19 surge for several weeks, bringing in mobile morgues and the National Guard to help.
The Sun Bowl had been played in each of the previous 86 seasons, tying it for the second longest consecutively played postseason bowl game, behind only the Rose Bowl Game Presented by Northwestern Mutual, which has been played annually since 1916.
The Sun Bowl is the ninth bowl game canceled because of COVID-19; the Bahamas, Celebration, Fenway, Hawaii, Holiday, Motor City, Pinstripe and Redbox bowls are the others.
The Sun Bowl pitted teams from the ACC and Pac-12. The ACC has now lost four bowl games that it had tie-ins with (Fenway, Holiday, Pinstripe and Sun) and the Pac-12 has lost three (Holiday, Redbox and Sun).