The Arizona–Arizona State football rivalry (also known as the Duel in the Desert) is a college football rivalry between the University of Arizona Wildcats (UA) and the Arizona State University Sun Devils (ASU). One of the longest football rivalries, the winner receives the Territorial Cup, created for the 1899 champion between schools in Arizona and which the NCAA has certified as the oldest rivalry trophy in college football. Although the Territorial Cup did not change hands as a regular part of the competition until 2001, the rivalry between the two schools continued after 1899, a semi-regular event until becoming an annual event, uninterrupted, from 1946 onwards. In the entire history of the rivalry, the game has never been contested anywhere beside Tempe or Tucson, and alternates between the two respective campuses. Games in odd-numbered years are played in Tempe at ASU, and even-numbered years in Tucson at UA. It is part of the wider Arizona–Arizona State rivalry, which crosses 20 varsity intercollegiate sports. History The rivalry dates to 1899 in the Arizona Territory, when the University of Arizona in Tucson played the Normal School of Arizona of Tempe – which later evolved into Arizona State University – as part of the Arizona Territorial Football League Championship. (Arizona achieved statehood in 1912.) The championship was a four-way series that also included Phoenix Union High School and Phoenix Indian School. Arizona and the Normal School met on November 30, 1899, for a Thanksgiving Day match at Carrillo Gardens in Tucson. Contemporary newspaper stories indicate that this was the first game for the University squad, while the Normal team was comparatively more experienced and better trained. The event drew 300 enthusiastic fans and was followed by a post-game Thanksgiving celebration for both teams hosted by the University. The "Normals", as they were called, won the game 11–2; as they had previously defeated the other schools, they were declared champions and received the Territorial Cup. The two teams played each other sporadically for the next decades, and have played almost every year beginning in 1925 (when Arizona State became a four-year college). The rivalry became particularly heated in the late 1950s amid the political contention over turning Arizona State College into an official university, a change opposed by the University of Arizona and many of its alumni. In 1958, the year the measure was to be put to a statewide vote, Arizona State defeated