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2016 TaxSlayer Bowl, Kentucky vs. Georgia Tech: Date, time, location, and everything to know
Big-name programs usually highlight the matchup each year.
Photo by Rob Foldy/Getty Images
The bowl lineup on New Years Eve gets started nice and early with the TaxSlayer Bowl kicking off at 11 a.m. ET.
The TaxSlayer Bowl, known for most of its history as the Gator Bowl, will feature Kentucky and Georgia Tech. It’s solidly a mid-tier bowl behind the major College Football Playoff and New Year’s Six games, and regularly features matchups between big-name programs from across the Midwest and Southeast.
The plus side of getting a lot of big name teams is you get large fanbases that are willing to travel, and more often than not the stadium is pretty full. The downside, however, with dealing with major programs at a mid-tier bowl game, is you get a lot of teams with higher expectations than the TaxSlayer Bowl, and they come to the game ready to just get it over with rather than excited to play for something. It doesn’t happen every year, but those are the risks you run in this situation.
Here is everything you need to know in preparation for this year’s TaxSlayer Bowl:
Date and time: Saturday, Dec. 31, 11:00 a.m.
TV channel: ESPN
Location: Jacksonville, Fla.
Stadium: EverBank Field
Last year’s score: Georgia 24, Penn State 17
Last year’s attendance: 58,212
Teams with the most all-time appearances: Clemson and Florida, 9
Teams with the most all-time wins: Florida, 7
Georgia Tech (8-4, 4-4 in ACC)
You slept on Paul Johnson, didn’t you? You thought that wiley son of a gun couldn’t rally his team. You thought he couldn’t get them off the mat after a disappointing 3-9 campaign in 2015, which fell far short of expectations.. Maybe you thought Johnson had lost his touch.
You were wrong.
When your offense is predicated on the run game, it better be something you can count on. While last season saw the Yellow Jackets slip just a bit, the bread and butter came back this season and finished inside the top 20 of rushing efficiency according to S&P+. That combined with a slight improvement in defensive efficiency and Georgia Tech got back on the right track.
As usual, they spread the wealth with three players who have 500 yards on the ground. Dedrick Mills, Marcus Marshall and Justin Thomas all have more than 95 carries as well.
But the season wasn’t without peril. After a 3-0 start, Tech dropped three straight to Clemson, Miami and Pitt. The team won four of its next five to secure bowl eligibility. For those ready to fire Johnson after 2015’s letdown, 2016 was just a reminder that he does have it in him to keep Georgia Tech humming along (he’s only won fewer than seven games twice since taking over in 2009). The option attack is back in the postseason. And you bet it travels.
Kentucky (7-5, 4-4 in SEC)
In terms of up-and-down seasons, Kentucky is one of the teams in the country that has definitely had one of those. Kentucky opened the season by losing to Southern Miss at home, and they did so by giving up 34 unanswered points to Golden Eagles offensive coordinator Shannon Dawson, whom Kentucky fired after last season.
That, paired with the 45-7 loss to Florida the following week, made it look like Wildcats head coach Mark Stoops, who managed to get himself a $12 million buyout, was a dead man walking in Lexington. But the WIldcats managed to beat South Carolina, Vanderbilt, Mississippi State, and Missouri to amazingly keep them very much alive in the SEC East race entering November.
Losses to Georgia and Tennessee would put the SEC East title out of reach for the Wildcats, though they made it to six wins after beating Austin Peay, making them bowl-eligible, and quieted some of the talks surrounding Stoops’s job security. A regular season-closing upset of rival Louisville — and Heisman Trophy front-runner Lamar Jackson — probably silenced them.
Running backs Benny Snell and Boom Williams have been bright spots. Quarterback Stephen Johnson has accounted for over 1,500 yards passing, as well.
Had Kentucky not had the turnaround that it did, especially with the way things looked inside the SEC East, Stoops would have likely been fired after this season. But becoming bowl-eligible for the first time since 2010 looks like it’s given Stoops at least another year at the helm.
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