2017 Celebration Bowl
| 2017 Celebration Bowl | |||||||||||||||||||
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| 3rd Celebration Bowl | |||||||||||||||||||
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| Date | December 16, 2017 | ||||||||||||||||||
| Season | 2017 | ||||||||||||||||||
| Stadium | Mercedes-Benz Stadium | ||||||||||||||||||
| Location | Atlanta, Georgia | ||||||||||||||||||
| MVP | Offense: #22 RB Marquell Cartwright, NC A&T Defense: #29 CB Franklin "Mac" McCain III, NC A&T | ||||||||||||||||||
| Favorite | North Carolina A&T (by 9.5 pts) | ||||||||||||||||||
| National anthem | Jekalyn Carr | ||||||||||||||||||
| Referee | Jay Edwards (C-USA) | ||||||||||||||||||
| Halftime show | Blue and Gold Marching Machine GSU Tiger Marching Band | ||||||||||||||||||
| Attendance | 25,873 | ||||||||||||||||||
| Payout | US$1,000,000 (Per Conference) | ||||||||||||||||||
| United States TV coverage | |||||||||||||||||||
| Network | ABC RedVoice, LLC | ||||||||||||||||||
| Announcers | Mark Neely, Jay Walker, & Tiffany Greene (ABC) Sam Crenshaw, Randy McMichael, & Lericia Harris (RedVoice) | ||||||||||||||||||
| Nielsen ratings | 1.59 (Viewers) | ||||||||||||||||||
The 2017 Celebration Bowl was a post-season American college football bowl game that was played on December 16, 2017 at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, Georgia. This third Celebration Bowl game matched the champion of the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference, against the champion of the Southwestern Athletic Conference, the two historically black division I conferences. The event was the finale of the 2017 FCS football season for both conferences as neither had teams earn an at large selections into the NCAA Division I FCS football playoffs and their champions abstain from the tournament.
The game kicked off at 12:00 PM (EST) and was televised live on ABC, as the kickoff game to the 2017 Bowl season. ESPN Events was the organizer of the game, while the 100 Black Men of Atlanta managed the game's ancillary events. The #7th ranked North Carolina A&T Aggies won the game, beating #13th ranked Grambling State Tigers by the score of 21–14, claiming the 2017 black college football national championship