Finally, with all of the college football games (aside from Army-Navy) complete, we can look ahead to the bowl season. Teams will find out where they’re going bowling at some point on Sunday, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t try to tell you where every team will be going. We’ve been patiently tracking rumors and conversations about who will be going where. After patiently dealing with all of the rules and regulations for each conference, here are my best guesses as to every bowl matchup.
Remember: Nowadays, bowl projections are more of an art than a science. Most conferences no longer allow the bowls to select teams in order, but instead provide “pools” of teams for certain tiers of bowls. The Group of 5 conferences essentially have no selection order preference. The conferences then work with the bowls to determine which team goes where. Anything can be the cause for this–geography, fan interests, matchup quality, whether the conference thinks its team is more likely to win, or any other reason. Therefore, at the end of this article, I will provide a list of which conference pools would be tied to which bowl. That way, you have as much information as possible when figuring out where each team could be headed.
79 teams are bowl-eligible this year, and there are 78 slots available in bowl games. Right now, I have Eastern Michigan being the unlucky team that will stay home, though it could definitely be Toledo or Kent State.
I will also update these for the next few hours Saturday night if any credible rumors come in.
College Football Playoff
| Peach Bowl | Sat, Dec 28, 4:00 PM | LSU | vs | Oklahoma |
| Fiesta Bowl | Sat, Dec 28, 8:00 PM | Ohio State | vs | Clemson |
This is simple enough. No. 1 plays No. 4, and No. 2 plays No. 3. The committee will ensure that the No. 1 team is not given a geographic disadvantage, so LSU will get the Peach Bowl against Oklahoma.
The times for these matchups are flexible and not yet set, but given that Ohio State vs Clemson will by far be the bigger draw, I expect that to be the game given prime time billing.
