MaizeandBlue
Senior
guess i was wrong?
cliffs: each Michigan player is getting a $400 best buy gift card, and each OSU player is getting a Wii
ESPN - Nintendo Wiis, tech gifts top 2007's best bowl prizes - College Football
cliffs: each Michigan player is getting a $400 best buy gift card, and each OSU player is getting a Wii
ESPN - Nintendo Wiis, tech gifts top 2007's best bowl prizes - College Football
They shopped. They splurged. The annual quest by bowl officials to show-up one another and in some cases, raise the profile of their games with the hottest, latest tech toys for each player has been all wrapped up.
These aren't stocking stuffers, folks.
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AP Photo/Paul Sakuma
The Nintendo Wii is the hot gift this bowl season.
"Ours kick butt," Mark Neville, a spokesman for the San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia and Pacific Life Holiday bowls, said with a laugh, reveling in the fact the Holiday Bowl was one of three able to track down the coveted Nintendo Wii with two remote controls ($345).
But nobody else is getting the iPod Touch, pointed out Mark Wallington, of the Pioneer Las Vegas Bowl. According to him, "it's the coolest thing in America."
Unless you're one of the four teams playing in Orlando.
Florida, Michigan, Boston College and Michigan State get to pick whatever the heck they want in a Best Buy shopping spree arranged by Florida Citrus Sports, which hosts the Champs Sports and Capital One bowls.
You can't put a price tag on the national title, though, and in addition to their shot at one, LSU and Ohio State will also receive a Nintendo Wii package, complete with four games.
Although not everyone was lucky enough to get the Wii, there are enough other gadgets and gizmos going around to re-stock the Best Buy Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow gets to raid.
In case anyone from UConn or Wake Forest gets lost while driving 140 mph in circles at the Lowe's Motor Speedway, the Meineke Car Care Bowl is providing them with a Garmin navigation system.
Hungry? The Insight Bowl has a Frito Lay Snack Pack waiting -- with an Xbox 360, of course.
Mum's the word at the AT&T Cotton Bowl headquarters, where president Rick Baker has a long-standing policy of keeping the gifts a secret until they're in the players' hands.
Bowls are allowed to spend $500 on each player (the NCAA increased it from $350 in 2005). There's usually one particularly pricey gizmo, complimented by a few more traditional (read you-can't-play-with-it-so-store-it-until-you-have-grandkids-to-show) gifts.
Here's a look at who else got the Wii, who got the boot (literally) and how the bowl competition fared off the field:
The Best Gift Ever: The Champs Sports Bowl and the Capital One Bowl are letting all four teams loose in Best Buy (not at the same time, of course) with a $400 gift certificate for each player to get whatever he wants. Won't fit on the plane home? Not a problem. They'll mail it. And Tebow, the Heisman Trophy winner, doesn't even have to worry about roaming the aisles while Florida fans gawk at him and mob him for autographs. The Gators and Michigan will be there before the store opens. Boston College and Michigan State will actually have to mingle with the customers one evening because of their practice schedules.
Top shelf: The Nintendo Wii. Only three bowls -- the Holiday, Allstate BCS National Championship and Valero Alamo -- were each able to snag about 250 of these. Unless you're camping out at Toys 'R' Us, waiting for the shipment to come in, good luck getting one of your own.
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