Notre Dame defeated Penn State 37-34 in the Orange Bowl on Thursday night to advance to the College Football Playoff national championship game.
The national semifinals matchup between the No. 7 Fighting Irish and No. 6 Nittany Lions was arguably the best of the 10 games in this year's new 12-team College Football Playoff format.
That game was the 90th postseason game played as part of the historic Orange Bowl.
Notre Dame's playoff win in the Orange Bowl was its third in six all-time appearances at the Orange Bowl. Thirty-six different college teams, including Oklahoma, have won a postseason game played at the Orange Bowl.
No college team, however, has won more games played in the Orange Bowl in Miami than the Oklahoma Sooners. Twelve of OU's 31 total bowl victories were at the Orange Bowl, and the Sooners' 20 Orange Bowl appearances are the most of any college football program.
Beginning in 1954, the Big Seven Conference had an agreement with the Orange Bowl allowing for the Big Seven, and later the Big 8 champion, to appear every year in that bowl. That agreement was altered when the Big 12 came into form in 1996 with the merger of the Big 8 and four teams from the Southwest Conference. The Big 12 moved its primary bowl agreement to the Fiesta Bowl.
Between 1954 and 1995, Oklahoma and Nebraska made a combined 37 Orange Bowl appearances. The Sooners' Orange Bowl record is 12-8. The Cornhuskers have won eight times in 17 postseason trips to the Orange Bowl.
The Orange Bowl, of course, is one of the hosts in the College Football Playoff rotation, and before this year was a bowl location for one of the New Year's Six bowl assignments, which included the CFP games and before that the BCS National Championship Game.
The first Orange Bowl game was held at Miami Field in 1935 between Bucknell and Miami. Bucknell won 26-0. A new stadium, Miami Orange Bowl, was built and opened in 1937. That facility remained in operation until 1996. After that, the Orange Bowl moved to a new location in Miami at what today is known as Hard Rock Stadium (it had several names and title sponsors prior to Hard Rock purchasing the naming rights).
Since 2008, Miami has played its regular-season home games at Hard Rock Stadium, the site of the Orange Bowl.
Hard Rock Stadium was the setting for Notre Dame's thrilling win over Penn State on Thursday night. Oklahoma has never played in the 2015 renovation to the current Orange Bowl site that is Hard Rock Stadium.
The Sooners' last two Orange Bowl appearances were on Jan. 3, 2001, and Jan. 1, 2005 -- both highly memorable for different reasons. On the former occasion, Oklahoma completed an undefeated season (13-0), winning its seventh national championship by defeating Florida State, 13-2.
The Sooners weren't so fortunate four years later. Again playing for the national championship, OU was on the wrong end of a 55-19 beatdown administered by USC.
Oklahoma has won four of its seven national championships playing in the Orange Bowl. Besides the 2000 national championship, the Bud Wilkinson-coached 1955 Sooners defeated No. 3 Maryland 20-6, capturing OU's second national title. That OU team was in the midst of its NCAA record 47-game winning streak.
On Jan. 1, 1976, Barry Switzer led the 1975 Big 8 champions to the Orange Bowl to face Michigan. The No. 3 Sooners prevailed 14-6. Because top-ranked Ohio State lost earlier in the day to UCLA in the Rose Bowl, Oklahoma jumped to the No. 1 spot in the final Associated Press Poll, claiming the Sooners' fifth national championship.
Switzer was still the man in charge for another OU national championship celebration in the Orange Bowl, capping off the 1985 season. The No. 3 Sooners defeated No. 1 Penn State 25-10.