So a quick explanation: 64 Teams, 32 Bowl Games, 11 Conferences (plus 1 Independent). In the Spirit of All Things Ranked, I'll Go from Bottom to Top. Feel free to disagree or agree. I know that your opinion is no more valid than mine and so I shall be free to ignore it with obnoxious refutations or embrace it with obnoxious exaltations. Onto the Awards!
(for each, conference name followed by 2007-2008 bowl record...)
The MAC: 0 – 3
Invitees: Ball State, Bowling Green, Central Michigan
Bowl Invitations: Motor City (Central Michigan), International (Ball State), GMAC (Bowling Green)
Bowl Invitations Rank: 12th
Overall Rank: 12th
Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m a big fan of the MAC. In basketball. But in football, the MAC is the equivalent to kind of cute girl in high school who didn’t just get a reputation, but earned one. So feverish to get as many bowl games as possible for an admittedly minor conference, they’ve gone and taken the three worst bowl games available. The Motor City Bowl offers up all the charm and ambiance of Detroit, Michigan in the dead of winter. The International Bowl is played in Toronto, home of the 110 yard, 3-down variety of football. On the Saturday afternoon when the NFL playoffs begin. And it gets worse, as the GMAC is billing itself as the nuts course on Sunday, following the second day of NFL playoffs. Oh, and the game is in Mobile, Alabama. A sure enough city to visit if you’re into history and the march for civil rights. But a minor hiccup of a football game? Sorry. These three collective bowls would not be missed. Except by the MAC.
Now, as I will state later on, it’s one thing to offer yourself promiscuously to the various bowl invitation committees, trying to win as many invites as possible. It’s another thing to lose each invitation. But it’s truly awful when each losing team gives up at least 50 points in the process. Central Michigan (MAC Champ) loses 51 – 48 to Purdue in the Motor City Bowl, a game that can only be described as “wildly interesting”. Not so wildly interesting are Ball State’s 52 – 30 loss in Toronto to Rutgers. Or Bowling Green giving up 56 more points than they scored to Tulsa, losing 63 – 7. Tulsa? The Division I school with the most inexplicable nickname (the Golden Hurricanes? They have hurricanes in Tulsa?). Yes, that’s right. The same Tulsa squad that lost to Oklahoma 62 – 21, now owns the “biggest blowout in bowl history”. So to recap: the MAC was outscored in only three bowl games 166 – 85. And only once looked frisky.
Conference-USA: 2 – 4
Invitees: Central Florida, East Carolina, Houston, Memphis, Southern Mississippi, Tulsa
Bowl Invitations: GMAC (Tulsa), R+L Carriers New Orleans (Memphis), Papajohns.com (Southern Miss), Autozone Liberty (Central Florida), Sheraton Hawaii (East Carolina), Texas (Houston)
Bowl Invitations Rank: 10th
Overall Rank: 11th
The only thing worse than being the slightly cute high school girl who earns a reputation is being her sluttier, uglier younger sister. CUSA, as they abbreviate themselves, will take any bowl invitation, whether it’s in Mobile, Houston, Birmingham, or Memphis. Though Honolulu is a nice feather for the conference champ East Carolina. If Baltimore offered a bowl game, for sure CUSA would be clamoring over that one too. Though the conference is young and in a seemingly endless transitional state, it remains more of a who's who of forgotten second-rate schools who every now and then have a good year and get a bit of press. At which point, they promptly leave for a better conference (see: Cincinnati). Think Memphis would love to move into the ACC? You bet!
Now, no disrespect to their one big win (sorry Tulsa. 63 – 7 over Bowling Green in the GMAC Bowl does not count). East Carolina 41 - 38 Boise State in the Sheraton Hawaii Bowl. Not a bad win for ECU, given Boise State’s prominent place on the edge of the radar over the past several years (and following their undefeated 2006 season). Boise State, of course, is famous for both surprising Oklahoma in last year's Tostitos Fiesta Bowl to complete that 13-0 record (the Statue of Liberty play followed by the proposal and the Fox Sports sideline reporter falling all over himself to get in on it and pretty much ruin the moment just like Fox Sports likes to do with pretty much everything else (see: World Series and pretty much all other baseball coverage, NFL Playoffs, and the infamous Glo-Puck experiment), and their Blue Turf. But ECU? Their team mascot is a Mardi Gras drag queen pirate decked in purple. Of course, there are other universities that embrace purple, to varying degrees of success (TCU, U.Washington and Northwestern offer a nice gradient of football). Arrgh, matey! Drop the purple and the cartoon pirate! Oregon already has Disney covered with their duck mascot!
As for CUSA’s losers? Central Florida (10 - 3 to Miss.State in the exciting Autozone Liberty Bowl), Memphis (44 - 27 Florida Atlantic in the taut R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl!), Southern Miss (31 - 21 Cincinnati at the papajohns.com Bowl), and Houston (20 - 13 TCU in the eponymous Texas Bowl). How many out there even knew Southern Miss was in the CUSA? The point is, if you get six bowl bids (just like, say, the Pac-10), they better be either namebrand bowl games or you better win. CUSA did neither. My bet is no player on Memphis team will ever wear their R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl gear. And if they give it to Katrina efforts, it’ll probably still sit in boxes.
The WAC: 1 – 3
Invitees: Boise State, Fresno State, Hawaii, Nevada
Bowl Invitations: Sheraton Hawaii (Boise State), Roady’s Humanitarian (Fresno State), New Mexico (Nevada), AllState Sugar (Hawaii)
Bowl Invitations Rank: 8th
Overall Rank: 10th
Any conference that continues to throw a bid to the Humanitarian Bowl (played outside in Boise) gets an extra point for me. Even when the Humanitarian Bowl is sponsored by a chain of highway rest areas. I’m not joking. And apart of the New Mexico Bowl, where Nevada lost to New Mexico (did they see it coming?), the other venues were respectable. Honolulu? Check. BCS game in New Orleans? CheckCheckCheck. Yet it seems that this WAC season was being rewarded partly because of last season (when Boise State went undefeated) and the potential to do it again with Hawaii. But you can’t go to the well too often. Simply put, the WAC was out of whack this year. Boise State got poisoned in Hawaii again and Hawaii simply had no business being in the Sugar Bowl. Add in Nevada getting goose-egged 23-0 to New Mexico in the "New Mexico Bowl" and it's pretty depressing.
The ACC: 2 - 6
Invitees: Boston College, Clemson, Florida State, Georgia Tech, Maryland, Virginia, Virginia Tech, Wake Forest
Bowl Invitations: Emerald (Maryland), Champs Sports (Boston College), Meineke Car Care (Wake Forest), Roady’s Humanitarian (Georgia Tech), Gaylord Hotels Music City (Florida State), Chick-Fil-A (Clemson), Konica Minolta Gator (Virginia), FedEx Orange (Virginia Tech)
Bowl Invitations Rank: 9th
Overall Rank: 9th
I don’t get why the ACC got 8 games. Of course, the better question is why there are 32 bowl games. But all other things being equal, the majority of those 8 teams are destined to be whipping boys. And they were. The ACC is a basketball conference. We know this. Despite bringing in U. Miami of Florida, Virginia Tech and purported football school Boston College. Since when is a win over U. Miami of Florida in 1984 all the cred you need to be a football school? I don't get it. But then again, in Boston, your other choices for football are BU and Harvard. Though I bet MIT has a great punting unit. Miami didn’t qualify for a bowl (thank the lords!) with their 5 – 7 record. But BC wins (24 - 21 over Michigan State, another wannabe "football" school), so things are looking good for the ACC, right? Wrong! Other than that, you got Wake Forest covering 24 - 10 over UConn, a school that has had a program for like 3 years. Their six losers? VaTech, Florida State, Maryland, Clemson, Virginia, and Georgia Tech, who got swatted by annual underdog Fresno State 40 - 28, in a game not nearly as close as it sounds. Clemson lost in overtime to severely overrated SEC middle-of-the-packer Auburn. FSU sat at least 13 players for academic violations (nice job, Coach Bowden and friends!) and got pasted by Kentucky. Maryland lost by a touchdown to a young Oregon State team and Virginia lost a tough one at the incredibly named Gaylord Hotels Music City Bowl to Texas Tech, 31 – 28. And worst of all, in a game that seemed theirs for the taking, VaTech roared out to a 17 – 0 deficit against Kansas in the FedEx Orange Bowl and then managed to almost come all the way back, losing 24 – 21. It’s been a tough year for the Hokies, and a win would have been a nice way to close that chapter and move forward. Instead they are the trivia answer to the question: “Kansas, the most overrated team in the 2007 football season, won the FedEx Orange bowl. Who did they beat?”
Independents: 0 – 1
Invitee: Naval Academy
Bowl Invitations: San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl
Bowl Invitations Rank: 6th
Overall Rank: 8th
Now I must begin by saying my dad went to the Naval Academy, so this ranking reflects that. But seriously: if I said "would you rather play a semi-worthless bowl game in San Diego or El Paso?" which would you pick? San Diego or Mobile? Or Birmingham? Or Memphis? Or Houston? Detroit? Boise? Shreveport? Orlando? I'll give you New Orleans, but only for the Sugar Bowl. No matter how awful-sounding the San Diego Country Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl sounds (and it sounds awful and is a mouthful), the R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl is worse. So San Diego it is. It's just too bad that they had to go and lose. Not the best way to end the season that saw them beat Air Force and Army for a sixth consecutive year and beat (a broken) Notre Dame squad for the first time since the Kennedy Administration. So after choking a veritable home game, they probably realized "Hey! We're not in Mobile or Shreveport! Let's head downtown and pick up some chicks!" I know this because I have Naval Academy alumni friends (and family). And every last one of them is an absolute hormonal terror on the town. Which makes me wonder about my dad and how he met my mom. Perhaps it's best to just move on...
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