This remained the only Rose Bowl appearance for
Indiana until the
2026 Rose Bowl. USC was a two touchdown favorite; this was the first Rose Bowl in
fifteen years in which the West Coast team was favored. In the intervening fourteen games, the Big Ten had won ten and lost four (
1960,
1961,
1963,
1966). Being an even-numbered year for the bowl game, Indiana wore their crimson jerseys as the home team and USC wore their white shirts as the designated visitors.
USC The
top-ranked and
Pac-8 champion Trojans came into the game with a 9–1 record, losing only at
Oregon State in the November mud in a close 3–0 game. They fell to fourth in the AP poll, then reclaimed the top spot a week later after a close 21–20 win over
rival and then-#1
UCLA in their heavily-anticipated conference finale, securing another trip to the Big Ten/Pac-8 classic. Runner-up Oregon State had a conference loss (at
Washington) and a tie (at UCLA), and the deflated UCLA Bruins lost again the following week 32–14 at home to non-conference
Syracuse. The Trojans were led by their powerful junior tailback
O. J. Simpson, a
junior college transfer from
San Francisco. a week before defeating
Purdue. A three-way league title championship was created when all three finished with 6–1 league records, each defeating and losing to one of the other. Purdue was ineligible because of the "no-repeat" rule by the Big Ten and the "Rose Bowl or no bowl" rule enforced by both of the participating conferences (Big Ten and AAWU). Purdue had played in Pasadena the
previous year, beating
USC by a point, 14–13. The conference's athletic directors voted to award the Rose Bowl bid to Indiana over Minnesota, albeit not unanimously. Indiana was considered the logical choice because they were the only Big Ten school yet to appear in the game. Minnesota coach Murray Warmath argued in vain that the Gophers deserved the bid because their prior two Rose Bowl teams, after the
1960 and
1961 seasons, received at-large bids because there was no agreement between the Big Ten and the Rose Bowl at the time; thus, technically, the Gophers never had received a Rose Bowl bid pursuant to that arrangement. Ironically, if Purdue had beaten Indiana in the season finale, the Boilermakers would have had sole possession of the conference championship, but Minnesota presumably would have received the Rose Bowl bid as the second place team in lieu of the ineligible Boilers. Instead, Indiana scored a 19–14 upset over Purdue, giving Minnesota a share of the conference championship but costing them a trip to Pasadena.
Quarterback Harry Gonso led the Hoosiers into their first ever bowl game. ==Scoring==