Breaking down the Big 12 bowl picture.
With only a couple of weeks left in the regular season, the bowl picture is beginning to take shape.
The conference may have as many as ten bowl opportunities (seven direct tie-ins, three other potential opportunities) - an assured BCS bowl berth for the conference champion, then the Cotton, Independence, Insight, Alamo, Holiday, and Texas bowls for direct tie-ins, and then the Sun and Gator bowls, which will choose between a Big 12 and a Big East team for one of their spots, and a BCS at-large berth.
And, as it stands, nine conference teams may be able to hit the magic six-win mark needed to qualify for bowl participation.
In the North, Kansas and Missouri are locks, and in the South, Oklahoma, Texas, and Texas Tech are locked in. Texas A&M is already bowl-eligible at 6-5 with a rivalry game against Texas left, but the Aggies will be sputtering towards the postseason (but that’s another story entirely).
The only teams actually eliminated from postseason contention are Baylor, who is 3-7, and Iowa St., who has knocked off two potential bowl teams in a row, but is still only 3-8.
That leaves four teams - Kansas St. (5-5), Nebraska (5-6), Colorado (5-6), and Oklahoma St. (5-5).
Ron Prince’s Wildcats looked all set to wrap up a bowl bid a couple of weeks ago, as they were 5-3 with Iowa St. and Nebraska looming.
But, they lost 31-20 on the road to the 1-8 Cyclones, and this past Saturday, were on the short end of a 73-31 beatdown against Nebraska.
Oklahoma St. was 5-3 two weeks ago as well, with two tough, but very winnable home games upcoming. And they were a quarter away from that all-important sixth win, taking a 35-14 lead into the fourth quarter against Texas. But, the Cowboys wound up losing 38-35, and on Saturday, couldn’t make any early lead stand up in a 43-28 loss to the Jayhawks.
The Nebraska-Colorado game will decide if the conference winds up with nine bowl-eligible teams.
But, will all of those teams be suiting up for the postseason?
Whether or not that happens depends on a few things - if the Big 12 gets two teams in the BCS, if the Sun and/or Gator bowls go with Big East teams, and if the first two don’t work in the conference’s favor, if another bowl in need would want to take a chance on a 6-6 Big 12 team, or perhaps a 7-5 or better team from another conference (like the Big 12, Big 10, ACC, SEC, or one of the non-BCS conference that might have more bowl-eligible teams than tie-ins).
CBS Sports currently has the Big 12 getting two BCS bids (Oklahoma and Kansas) and eight bids overall, with Kansas St. being the lone bowl-eligible team left out (and Nebraska getting in over Colorado).
In Stewart Mandel’s projections on SI.com, he has nine conference teams getting in (Oklahoma and Texas in the BCS), including Kansas St.
Kansas St.‘s fate rests on beating either Missouri at home this week or win at Fresno St. in two weeks to be bowl-eligible, which isn‘t an enviable position to be in.
In the end, the Big 12 should be more than well-represented in the postseason, no matter who gets in and where they go.
Where will they go? Well, we’ll know after these next few exciting weeks of action.
Tags: Big 12 Football, Bowl Championship Series, Colorado Buffaloes, Kansas Jayhawks, Kansas St. Wildcats, Missouri Tigers, Nebraska Cornhuskers, Oklahoma Sooners, Texas A&M Aggies, Texas Longhorns, Texas Tech Red Raiders