[NU Sports] Bowl hopes

[Charles Herron]

Several things that I discovered while researching Bowls this season:

- Some good news - there are 35 bowl games scheduled.  Therefore, 70 teams (out of 120 in FBS) must play in those bowls.

- Some more good news - there are currently 57 teams 'bowl-eligible' (6 or more wins).  One of them cannot play in the post-season, USC

- that leaves 56 bowl-eligible teams in FBS - 14 short of the number required.

- 21 teams, including ours, have 5 victories.  Theses teams need at least one victory.  If I had to guess, 4 of those teams will not get one victory.  They are:

 South Florida - must face Miami (Florida), Louisville, and West Virginia
 Syracuse - must face Cincinnati and Pittsburgh
 Iowa State - must face Oklahoma State, Oklahoma, and Kansas State
 Texas Tech - must face Missouri and Baylor

- That leaves 17 teams that could/should win at least one more game.  56+17=73, just barely more than the 70 teams needed.

- There are 14 teams with 4 victories - they need to win two more games.  Two of them, Miami (Ohio) and Bowling Green, have only one more game scheduled, so they cannot reach 6.  Marshall, East Carolina and Central Florida all play one another down the stretch, so all three cannot 'win out'  Maybe Tennessee (with Vanderbilt and Kentucky), and Navy (with San Jose State and Army) can reach 6.  That would make 75 teams bowl-eligible, 5 more than needed.

- Take out C-USA, the Sun Belt, the WAC, the MAC and the Mountain West, and we should be able to land somewhere.  That's why Jim Delaney makes the big bucks.

- Or just go ahead and beat Michigan State - that would greatly simplify things.

Chuck Herron, Tech '85