In one regard, the Pac-12 hasn’t splintered: All 12 schools remain tied to the bowls affiliated with the conference in recent years. Exceptions are made for teams that qualify for the College Football Playoff as conference winners or at-large entrants. Otherwise, what’s past is present for the 2024-25 seasons.
The Hotline will provide weekly projections for the teams throughout the regular season.
Please note: We also unveil our weekly CFP picks each Monday.
The least interesting dates on Oregon State’s schedule are the most important, at least for keeping the bowl math closer to long division than trigonometry.
The Beavers are halfway through the two-game stretch, with one victory in the books and a second challenge ahead.
Allow us to explain.
This unprecedented season began with loads of attention on the program and notable matchups against San Diego State, Oregon and Purdue. Meanwhile, the back half of the schedule features a string of teams with winning records.
Crammed between the first month and the second half lies a brief transition period that’s easy to overlook but vital to the Beavers’ bottom line.
They handled Colorado State last weekend, although two overtime periods were needed to secure OSU’s fourth victory of the season.
Now comes a date Saturday afternoon at Nevada.
If the Beavers (4-1) are victorious, their magic number for bowl eligibility would be reduced to one.
Six games to win one game.
That matters because five upcoming opponents have winning records: UNLV (4-1), Cal (3-2), San Jose State (4-1), Washington State (4-1) and Boise State (4-1). The sixth team is Air Force (1-4), which was recently blown out by Navy.
The Beavers could secure a bowl berth simply by handling Air Force.
But if Oregon State loses this weekend at Nevada, the bowl bar doubles in height. The Beavers would need two wins against that collection of six opponents — handling Air Force alone would not be enough.
Their margin for error would drop, the pressure would increase and the math would get substantially more difficult.
To the updated bowl projections …
College Football Playoff
Team: Utah (Big 12 champion)
Comment: Admittedly, the Hotline’s faith could prove misplaced, but we’re sticking with the Utes to win the Big 12 until they are mathematically eliminated. (Fine print: We reserve the right to change our mind if they lose at Arizona State on Friday night.)
College Football Playoff
Team: Oregon (Big Ten at-large)
Comment: Depending on the outcome of the super-mega collision against Ohio State this weekend, the Ducks could get moved into our pool of automatic qualifiers as the projected Big Ten champion.
Alamo Bowl
Team: Washington State
Comment: Based on their remaining schedule, the Cougars should win at least nine games and could win as many as 11, which would vault them onto the top of the sub-playoff bowls. (Their slim CFP chances vanished with the loss at Boise State last month.)
Holiday Bowl
Team: Colorado
Comment: The Buffaloes would benefit from mediocrity up and down the lineup because they have immense appeal to bowl officials (thanks to Deion Sanders) and because the Pac-12 selection process would allow the Buffs to jump teams that are within one victory …read more
Source:: The Mercury News – Entertainment
