2015 Independence Bowl
The 2015 Independence Bowl was a college football bowl game that was played on Saturday, December 26, 2015 at Independence Stadium in Shreveport, Louisiana in the United States. The 40th annual Independence Bowl featured the 2015 [Virginia Tech Hokies football team|Virginia Tech Hokies] of the Atlantic Coast Conference against the 2015 [Tulsa Golden Hurricane football team|Tulsa Golden Hurricane] of the American Athletic Conference. Sponsored by Camping World, the game was officially known as the Camping World Independence Bowl. The first half of the game, in which 76 points were scored, was the highest scoring half in college football bowl history until the second half of the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl the next year. Montgomery would later become the offensive coordinator and interim head coach for the Hokies in 2025.
Team selection
The game was to feature a team from the Atlantic Coast Conference against a team from the Southeastern Conference. However, college football analyst Phil Steele projected prior to the game that neither an ACC nor an SEC team would be selected for the game, projecting that the 2015 [Minnesota Golden Gophers football team|Minnesota Golden Gophers] of the Big Ten Conference and the 2015 [San Jose State Spartans football team|San Jose State Spartans] of the Mountain West Conference would be selected for the game instead.Virginia Tech was chosen from the ACC, and Tulsa was chosen after the SEC did not have enough eligible teams.