The HBCU Legacy Bowl, a college football all-star game featuring the top 100 NFL draft-eligible players from Historically Black Colleges and Universities, has struck a multi-year partnership with Zebra Technologies to supply their sensor-based ball and player tracking technology. The Black College Football Hall of Fame, which is housed within the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio, will also receive a donation from Zebra.
The inaugural HBCU Legacy Bowl will be held at Tulane University on Feb. 19 (broadcast live on NFL Network at 4 p.m. ET), but Zebra’s technology will not be used until the 2023 bowl event. Zebra embeds RFID chips in players’ shoulder pads and the football itself to collect real-time player and ball movement data. The company’s tracking software
“The capabilities of our RFID sports tracking system will help showcase the talent of the student athletes in a unique way, as well as provide the data and performance metrics necessary for NFL coaches, scouts and general managers to evaluate prospective NFL talent,” Bill Burns, chief product & solutions officer at Zebra Technologies, said in a statement.
HBCU Legacy Bowl players will also wear Zebra’s sensors in practices leading up to the 2023 game. Zebra has held a ball and player tracking deal with college football’s Senior Bowl since 2018, and recently extended that deal thru 2024.
