The Tribune

By RENALDO DORSETT

Sports Reporter

rdorsett@tribunemedia.net

SPORTS tourism in the Bahamas achieved another milestone when it was announced that the Bahamas was one of two new venues set to host NCAA postseason games in 2014.

Various media outlets, including ESPN, Yahoo, CBS Sports, Sports Illustrated among others announced that the Bahamas will host a bowl game featuring Conference USA teams.

The Bahamas has already garnered NCAA basketball interest with the Battle 4 Atlantis and Junkanoo Jam tournaments along with the BBF’s “Summer of Thunder” exhibition series.

Now, the 15,000 seat Thomas A Robinson has facilitated the expansion to the gridiron with the 2014 Bahamas Bowl.

The last international location to host an NCAA Bowl was Toronto, Canada, which hosted the International Bowl from 2007 to 2010.

Boca Raton, Florida, was also selected as a new bowl location, held at the Florida Atlantic University Stadium on the FAU campus.

The new additions bring the number of bowl games to 38 after several other conferences also announced new bowl games earlier in the week.

On Monday, the Mid-American Conference (MAC), Sun Belt Conference and ESPN announced the creation of the Camellia Bowl in Montgomery, Alabama, also set to begin in 2014.

The Bahamas Bowl will see C-USA and MAC teams square off.

It was a busy day for C-USA as it also announced new six-year deals from 2014 to 2019, according Brett McMurphy of ESPN.

In 2014, NCAA football will also dump the BCS system in favour of a four-team playoff televised by ESPN.

In May, Tyrone Sawyer, director of sports tourism development at the Ministry of Tourism, projected the Bahamas to earn more than $13 million in revenue from sports tourism in 2013, particularly due to the success of some recent events, including the FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup qualifier tournament, LPGA PureSilk Bahamas Open and the exhibition match between England’s Tottenham Hotspur and Jamaica’s “Reggae Boyz “which he said “has done a great deal for the country’s sports tourism profile.”

The addition of major college football, which finished fourth in a 2012 Harris Poll of America’s top 10 Favourite Sports, is set to strengthen the Bahamas’ rapidly expanding sports tourism profile.