Somewhere in the fight-filled, money-chasing hustle that the college bowl season has become, a national champion will emerge.
Too bad that so far, hardly any of the games on the road to that national championship have been worth a hoot.
And interesting to see that all the games that supposedly mean nothing is where most of the fun and mayhem has played out.
The day after New Year’s Day used to be when college football folded up the tent, but now it’s simply time for a break. Including Thursday’s Sugar Bowl — the quarterfinal showdown between Georgia and Notre Dame that was pushed back a day due to the deadly attack in New Orleans — Jan. 2 opened with four meaningful games left on the schedule and 18 days left to go before a champion is crowned.
The most notable stuff over bowl season, meanwhile, has come out of the nearly three dozen bowl games that aren’t supposed to mean that much, but in many ways, still do.
A look at who won, who lost and what we’d all be missing if we boiled down college football to only its 12-team playoff.
Colorado and Alabama were among the teams that focused on the “brotherhood” of football and leaned into the idea that even their NFL-bound stars were showing solidarity by playing in these bowl games.
At CU, that meant amping up the insurance policies for Heisman winner Travis Hunter and quarterback Shedeur Sanders.
“To talk about where the game is, where it’s going and how leadership is taking care of the players, I thought that’s excellent,” Colorado linebackers coach Andre’ Hart said.
On a similar note, quarterback Jalen Milroe singed up for Alabama’s game against Michigan, but the Tide fell flat 19-13. Turns out, more than a dozen of Milroe’s teammates opted not to join him, and not even a first-round quarterback can overcome that.
Nothing these days says “big” in sports better than Snoop Dogg himself. This year, the rapper-commentator-celebrity put his name on the Arizona Bowl, and also offered all the Colorado State and Miami (Ohio) players in that game a chance to make some NIL money.
“College football fans are exhausted by the constant talk around NIL, conference realignment, coach movement, transfer portal and super conferences,” Snoop said in a video posted on social media.
Just as everyone was saying “Amen to that,” Heisman finalist Cam Ward put his own spin on all of this. The Miami quarterback threw for three touchdowns in the first half, but sat out the second in a 42-41 loss to Iowa State in the tastiest game on the schedule — the Pop Tarts Bowl.
Asked what led to that decision, Hurricanes coach Mario Cristobal said he was keeping that information private. But not much needed to be said. Either Ward and Sanders could end up as the top pick in this year’s draft.
This bowl season gave us the Miami-Iowa State thriller and four games decided in multiple overtimes.
Toledo and Pittsburgh went six OTs before the Rockets prevailed 48-46. That game broke a college bowl record of five OTs that was all of one-day old — set when South Florida beat San Jose State 41-39.
The Sun Bowl and Armed Forces Bowl were both decided by defenses (Navy and Louisville) denying 2-point conversions in the waning seconds.
Kansas State overcame a 17-point deficit to beat Rutgers 44-41 in a game featuring 943 yards in offense.
One of the multi-OT games was the Texas 39-31 win over Arizona State in the playoff quarterfinals, aka the Peach Bowl.
Never mind that Texas tried to give this game away multiple times — two missed field goals in the fourth quarter were part of that — this was the single game thus far in the playoff that has been remotely compelling and the only one decided by single digits.
The ugly side of sports spilled out in one game between East Carolina and N.C. State that featured a bench-clearing brawl triggered when an ECU player snatched a towel from the beltline of his opponent.
It ended with official Rod Tucker battered and bloodied — left with a nasty cut under his eye after trying to break up the fracas.
There was also the little matter of South Carolina coach Shane Beamer having to be restrained from going after his Illinois counterpart, Bret Bielema, after Bielema made a gesture toward the Carolina bench when he went out to check on an injured player.
Bielema explained he was upset with the Gamecocks use of a signal that typically means a team isn’t going to attempt to return a kick and, so, indicates to the coverage team that it can slow down. Beamer wasn’t much into hearing explanations after his team’s 21-17 loss in the Military Bowl.
“In all my years of coaching I’ve never seen that happen,” Beamer said. “An opposing coach come over while his player’s hurt and basically have something to say to the opposing head coach.”
Coaches in bowl games and the College Football Playoff both found themselves fighting the churn of the transfer portal, which was open from Dec. 9-28 and, thus, produced tumult in rosters across the board.
Mississippi coach Lane Kiffin said he’d cross-reference his roster every morning while his players filed into breakfast leading up to Thursday night’s Gator Bowl against Duke.
“He’s not in the portal, he’s not in the portal, he’s opting out,” Kiffin said. “It’s totally changed. There needs to be something.”
Or maybe someone.
Kiffin and Duke coach Manny Diaz seconded the notion brought up earlier in the week by Penn State’s James Franklin, who would love to see retired Alabama coach Nick Saban become the commissioner of college football.
“Let’s get a commissioner of college football that is waking up every single morning and going to bed every single night, making decisions that’s in the best interest of college football,” Franklin said.
As of now, there are several commissioners — of the SEC, the Big Ten, the Big 12 and ACC — who make those decisions.
All of which has led us to where we are — 18 days left and a few more games to determine what works, what doesn’t and what needs to change before all these games, all of them meaningful in some way, start up again in 2025.
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