BC bowling

Here's a reality check for Boston College football in terms of its status as a bowl team.

Until you win a championship of some kind, you are always going to be passed by teams with worse records, or teams that you have beaten in head to head competition for lucrative bowl bids.

Unless...

The final bowl pairings will be announced on Sunday. BC will not play in a BCS bowl. BC will not play in a January 1 bowl and unless there is some last second maneuvering, BC will not play in a Florida bowl, which is always a nice reward for a good season.

The reason has nothing to do with W's and L's. Or at least very little to do with W's and L's. The Eagles went 9-3 this season, which is more than decent. They beat Virginia Tech, Clemson, Maryland and Florida State. They beat Central Michigan and BYU. All bowl teams.

But they did not beat Miami. And they didn't make it to the ACC title game.

Now the prospects of BC's bowl business are hinged on what happens with Georgia Tech in the ACC title game on Saturday.

A Tech victory will almost certainly lock BC out of the 3 "A" list ACC bowls in terms of desire--Chick-Fil-A Bowl in Atlanta, Gator Bowl in Jacksonville, Fla. and Champs Sports Bowl in Orlando.

With Georgia Tech in the BCS game in the Orange Bowl as ACC champion, Virginia Tech will go to the Chick-Fil-A Bowl, Clemson will go to the Gator Bowl, and Wake Forest will go to the Champs Bowl.

BC will be slotted into the Music City Bowl in Nashville or the Meinke Car Care Bowl in Charlotte.

Decent, but maybe not for a 9-3 team who beat two of the teams going to "better" bowls.

The reason for this is that the bowls are about selling tickets. The BCS might be about rankings. But the other bowls are fans in seats and in hotel rooms.

Clemson has proved itself, Virginia Tech has proved itself and Wake Forest gets a break because it was a division champion, beat BC and had a better record.

If Wake beats Georgia Tech, the dynamics change. Virginia Tech will still go to the Chick-Fil-A Bowl, but the ACC says that since Georgia Tech will have had a two-game better record (7-1, to 5-3) than Clemson and the new rules state that only a team with one less win than the best team can be considered, the Gator Bowl must take Georgia Tech.

The Gator Bowl does not want to do that since the ACC title game is also in Jacksonville and feels that Tech will not bring any fans back to the same site a month after they visited.

The issue will be resolved by Saturday night says the ACC. Fair enough. But if Tech does lose to Wake and is forced to play in the Gator, then the Champs Bowl has a dilemma. Clemson will bring more people in the game against Purdue.

But Clemson played in the Champs Bowl last season. Clemson also lost to BC during the regular season and had a worse record.

BC wins right? We'll see. But if BC does get the bid to the Champs Bowl, it then becomes the most important bowl game in BC history in terms of image.

BC needs to bring at least 10,000 fans to the game. Anything less and the reputation that BC has of not being a good traveling team will be etched in acid. And if that happens, BC will never catch a break from bowls unless it wins a title of some kind, which guarantees a spot.
If we had to take odds, we would say that BC wouldn’t get a chance to prove or disprove itself as a bowl traveling team in Florida, because the guess here is that the Gator will lock into Clemson, whether Ga. Tech wins or loses. And if that happens, the loser of the ACC game probably will wind up in the Champs Bowl and BC will be shuffled back again.

But in the world of bowl business, you never know.

O'Brien flirting with others?

Lots of people are questioning whether BC coach Tom O'Brien will be filling any of the current coaching vacancies. The answer right now is no.

Nothing seems like a good fit. Rumors of Arizona State having an interest in O'Brien swirled around this week. But right now, those are nothing but rumors.

This weekend's games

Arkansas 28, Florida 24: Hogs go wild which gets them to New Orleans and the Sugar Bowl. Gators return to The Swamp and life in the SEC-Big Ten challenge of Florida bowl games.

Rutgers 12, West Virginia 10: O.K. This is still a stretch, but maybe it's the year of the Scarlet Knight in the Big East.

Navy 14, Army 10: Navy is better, but Army makes it close, which has been Army's problem in the recent history of this historic series.

USC 42, UCLA 21: Trojans march to Phoenix.

Oklahoma 38, Nebraska 23: Sooners get redemption for bad call in Oregon game which cost them a win and almost a BCS bid. This win rectifies part of that.