After 6:00 games update:
Well.... the dream is over. The chart doesn't show it quite exactly, partly because I miscounted and partly because I messed up two games, not realizing that bowl spots were going to be taken regardless of who won a game (I did recognize it for two games, but not for two others). Case in point, the Florida/Florida State game. I knew we wanted Florida to win, but forgot that even if Florida won, we'd still lose a bowl spot. Long story short, the number of bowl spots that actually remained viable for Illinois started lower than 8 (more likely 5.... I'll have to figure out how I messed up that counting at some point). So, we needed quite a bit more praying.
Regardless, here's the current table:
Game Time (CST): | Needs to Win: | Needs to Lose: | Invites Remaining: 8 |
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Tue 6:00 PM | Buffalo - 3 | Ball State - 20 | 7 |
Thu 2:30 PM | Fresno State - 40 | San Jose State - 9 | 7 |
Fri 11:00 AM | Kansas State - 17 | Texas - 22 | 6 |
Fri 2:30 PM ESPN+ | Coastal Carolina - 27 | South Alabama - 21 | 6 |
Fri 3:30 PM FS1 | Iowa State - 48 | TCU - 14 | 6 |
Sat 11:00 AM ESPN | Florida - 24 | Florida State - 21 | 6 |
Sat 11:00 AM BTN | Rutgers - 16 | Maryland - 40 | 5 |
Sat 1:00 PM ESPN+ | UTSA - 23 | North Texas - 45 | 4 |
Sat 1:00 PM ESPN+ | Georgia State - 37 | Troy - 10 | 4 |
Sat 2:45 PM ACCN | Virginia - 24 | Virginia Tech - 29 | 3 |
Sat 3:00 PM ESPN2 | SMU - 31 | Tulsa - 34 | 2 |
Sat 6:00 PM ESPN | Texas A&M - 24 | LSU - 27 | 1 |
Sat 6:00 PM | Middle Tennessee - 27 | Florida Atlantic - 17 | 1 |
Sat 6:00 PM FS1 | Kansas - 28 | West Virginia - 34 | 0 |
Sat 6:30 PM ACCN | Pitt -31 | Syracuse - 14 | 0 |
If both Cal and USC win on Saturday, then one of them is guaranteed a bowl invite. If they both lose, then neither will receive one. If only one wins, then we will be rooting against that team next week. For this week, let's just root against both.
Game Time (CST): | Needs to Win: | Needs to Lose: |
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Sat 9:30 PM ESPN | UCLA | Cal |
Sat 9:30 PM FS1 | BYU | USC |
Now, let's talk reality. At this moment, there are actually 83 bowl eligible teams. It felt like every 5-7 team that needed to win today, did... and that was super frustrating. In order for Illinois to get to a bowl at this point, this is what has to happen:
- Two or more of the bowl eligible teams need to decline invites. This is unlikely, but has happened, and there's some speculations that a couple teams may do it.
- Either Hawaii doesn't file a petition or the NCAA denies it if they do.
- Rutgers and Texas decline their bowl invites (as 5-7 teams). Texas has cause to do this, but I don't know why Rutgers would.
- Neither Cal nor USC get to 6 wins.
At the end of the day, this was still a fun season, and I haven't been this excited about a non-bowl season in quite some time.