For many years, the Rose Bowl provided a chance for the Pacific conference, chronically underrated by the rest of the country (which doesn't stay up for the night games and thinks the Left Coast is pantywaist, anyway) to pull a surprise.
The Northerners think that we Southerners are all pantywaist girliemen and we Southerners know that the North is a howling wasteland devoid of culture or civilisation.