Silicon Valley Football Classic

The Silicon Valley Bowl got off to a positive start as the 2000 game matched conference powers Air Force against Fresno State. The game drew about 85% of the stadium's capacity and fans saw an exciting 37–34 contest with one of the most memorable finishes of the year. With Air Force leading 37–34 with 14 seconds left, Fresno State faked a field goal, but holder Jason Simpson's pass to Giachino Chiaramonte fell incomplete in the end zone.

Destiny's Child performed at halftime.

The 2001 edition proved to be just as entertaining as Big Ten power Michigan State accepted an invitation to play Fresno State. The game was a near sellout with over 30,000 fans in attendance. Michigan State defeated Fresno State 44–35 in a shootout that was the last college game for the first overall pick of the 2002 NFL Draft, David Carr. Carr threw for 531 yards and 4 touchdowns in a game that also featured future NFL players Jeff Smoker, Charles Rogers, TJ Duckett, and Bernard Berrian.

In 2002 only 10,132 fans attended the third Silicon Valley Bowl, which featured Fresno State and Georgia Tech. The 2002 game was hampered by bad weather and a lack of fans compared to the previous years. Fresno State defeated Georgia Tech 30–21.

In 2003, the UCLA Bruins accepted an invitation to the 2003 game against Fresno State. Attendance for the game was 20,126 fans, which was approximately 64% of stadium capacity. After the 2003 game, the NCAA instituted new rules for the 2004–05 Bowl Season stating that stadiums had to draw at least 70% of their capacity for bowl games in order to continue hosting them.[1]

The 2004 game marked the end of the bowl. Although the bowl once again had pre-season bowl tie-ins with the WAC and Pac-10, neither conference produced enough bowl-eligible teams to fulfill their obligations to the Classic. Although Fresno State's 8–3 record would normally have gained the Bulldogs an invitation to the game, WAC conference champion Boise State opted to play in the Liberty Bowl against Louisville, thus allowing 2nd-place Fresno to play in the Humanitarian Bowl against Virginia in a matchup that was normally reserved for the WAC conference champion.

Silicon Valley Bowl officials invited Northern Illinois of the MAC and Troy of the Sun Belt as at-large teams. The two schools fielded relatively low-profile teams that year, and both schools were located more than 2,000 miles away from the game's location. The two teams also represented two of the three lowest-ranked bowl eligible teams in the NCAA that season. The only other bowl eligible team that could have been picked was another team from the MAC in Akron. Although higher profile teams such as Clemson and South Carolina were also bowl eligible both schools endured a self-imposed bowl ban that year because of a brawl that occurred between the two teams earlier in the season.

The 2004 Silicon Valley Bowl game took place during a severe thunderstorm that caused fans to not go to the game. Also, prior to the opening kickoff, the rain and wind caused an electrical transformer outside the stadium to malfunction, which caused two light stanchions inside the stadium to fail. There also were persistent problems with the television feed that included starting the game 23 minutes late. Game attendance was a series low at 5,494, which represented approximately 18% of Spartan Stadium's capacity.

The Classic was supposed to have a tie-in with the Pac-10 by offering an automatic berth to the 7th bowl eligible team in the conference. The Pac-10 and WAC tie-ins were supposed to make travel easier for fans of both bowl participants. However, during the bowl's five-year run, the Pac-10 conference only once produced enough bowl eligible teams to fill its spot in the game. The Classic received very little support from the local San Jose residents. Organizers hoped from the outset the host school would send its own San Jose Spartans to compete in the bowl, thus drawing attendance numbers up. Although the Spartans were bowl eligible in 2000, the bowl bid went to Fresno State because the Bulldogs finished with a better overall win–loss record.