ESPN College Football

FORT WORTH, Texas -- The Fort Worth Bowl on Tuesday extended its agreement with Conference USA for four years through the 2009 season.

The bowl earlier this year reached a deal with the Mountain West Conference for that league to provide a team for the game from the 2006-09 seasons.

C-USA has been part of the bowl since the game's inception in 2003. The third Fort Worth Bowl is scheduled Dec. 23 on the TCU campus, matching C-USA against the Big 12, which hasn't had enough bowl-eligible teams to fill its spot the past two years.

Fort Worth Bowl executive director Tom Starr said there is a provision in the new C-USA deal under which the Pacific 10 Conference would instead send a team to Fort Worth in 2007 if that league has a sixth bowl-eligible team.

C-USA commissioner Britton Banowsky said Tuesday that his conference also has future commitments past this season with its other four bowl partners: the Liberty, GMAC, Hawaii and New Orleans bowls.

Copyright 2005 by The Associated Press