2025 Music City Bowl
The 2025 Music City Bowl was a college football bowl game played on December 30, 2025, at Nissan Stadium in Nashville, Tennessee. The 27th annual Music City Bowl game began at approximately 4:30 p.m. CST and aired on ESPN. It was one of the 2025–26 bowl games concluding the 2025 FBS football season. The game was sponsored by the Liberty Mutual insurance company and was officially known as the Liberty Mutual Music City Bowl.
The Illinois Fighting Illini from the Big Ten Conference defeated the Tennessee Volunteers from the Southeastern Conference by a score of 30–28.
Teams
Consistent with conference tie-ins, the bowl featured Illinois from the Big Ten Conference and Tennessee from the Southeastern Conference. This was the first meeting of the Illinois and Tennessee football teams.
Illinois Fighting Illini
Illinois opened their season with five wins in their first six games, losing only to 19th-ranked Indiana, and were ranked as high as ninth. The Fighting Illini then lost back-to-back games; their record stood at 5–3 at the end of October. During November, Illinois won three of their four games, and entered the Music City Bowl with an 8–4 record.
Tennessee Volunteers
Tennessee compiled a regular-season record of 8–4, and were ranked each week. Each of their losses came to other ranked teams: Georgia, Alabama, Oklahoma, and Vanderbilt. Following a loss in their final regular-season game, Tennessee entered the Music City Bowl unranked.