An annual conference game between two historically black universities in the Southwestern Athletic Conference (SWAC), its location usually rotates between JSU's Mississippi Veterans Memorial Stadium in Jackson, Mississippi and SU's A. W. Mumford Stadium in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, but it has also been held at larger venues to accommodate the large crowds that the game draws.

Both JSU and SU are known to have finished among the top ten NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision schools in past annual home attendance figures.

[10] The intense rivalry extends beyond the game itself, featuring a battle between the schools' well-respected and popular marching bands, Jackson State's "Sonic Boom of the South" and Southern's "Human Jukebox.

JSU's hiring of Deion Sanders as head coach in 2020 drew a great deal of attention to the Tiger program in general[11] and the JSU-SU series in particular.

On October 23, 2022, ESPN's College GameDay program announced that it would broadcast live from Mississippi Veterans Memorial Stadium on the morning of the game.