The Camellia Bowl was founded in March 1961, when the Sacramento City-County Chamber of Commerce voted unanimously to accept an offer from the National Association for Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) to move its championship game to the city.
[1] The Camellia Bowl served as the NAIA Football National Championship game for three years.
For the smaller colleges and universities, as for the major programs, the national champion was determined by polls conducted by the leading news wire services.
The intent of the bowl was to match the two best non-major teams from a region consisting of the Pacific Coast and Rocky Mountain states.
[5] The NCAA agreed, and the I-AA title game was moved to the Pioneer Bowl in Wichita Falls, Texas, for 1981.