Bowl Alliance Waiting For Sec Title Game
The Builders Square Alamo Bowl announced Sunday that it will match the loser of the Texas-Texas A&M game against Michigan on Dec. 28 in San Antonio.
And as expected, Texas Tech (8-3) was given a bid to play Air Force (8-4) in the Weiser Lock Copper Bowl on Dec. 27 in Tucson, Ariz. Tech won seven of its last eight games to capture its third straight bowl bid.
The winner of the Texas-A&M game will represent the Southwest Conference in the Bowl Alliance and probably play in the Nokia Sugar Bowl on Dec. 31 in New Orleans.
Three of the Bowl Alliance’s teams have been determined: Big Eight champion Nebraska, ACC co-champion Florida State and at-large Notre Dame.
Top-ranked Nebraska (11-0) is set in the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl on Jan. 2 to meet Florida (11-0) if the Gators defeat Arkansas in the Southeastern Conference championship game Saturday in Atlanta. The Texas-A&M winner and either Virginia Tech or Miami, whichever of the Big East co-champs the Sugar or FedEx Orange Bowl selects, will occupy the other slots, along with Florida State and Notre Dame.
The Orange has the third and fifth selections and the Sugar fourth and sixth. They will use them Sunday after the Fiesta Bowl makes the first two picks.
Indications are that the Orange favors taking TV ratings-king Notre Dame with the third pick and matching the Fighting Irish with hometown favorite Miami with the fifth pick. But the Sugar might take Virginia Tech, which expects to bring a large crowd, with the fourth pick and knock Miami out of the Bowl Alliance and into the Toyota Gator Bowl. The Orange still would have Florida State as a possibility to match against Notre Dame.
The SWC team doesn’t figure to go until the Sugar’s No. 6 pick.
The Alamo was the fourth selecting bowl in the alliance of future Big 12 teams (Big Eight, plus Texas, A&M, Baylor and Tech). It decided on the A&M-Texas loser over Kansas and will take Michigan (9-3) after Penn State announced a news conference to take a bid to the Outback Bowl.
Sunday’s decision by the Alamo means Kansas (9-2) will go to the Jeep Eagle Aloha Bowl, the fifth-selecting Big 12 bowl, and play UCLA on Christmas Day.
Baylor, the other bowl-eligible team from the Big 12, was still in the picture for the Poulan/Weed Eater Independence Bowl, said the bowl’s executive director, Glen Krupica. But Baylor (7-4) is only in the picture if the bowl doesn’t get LSU.