College Football Bowl Projections 2019, Week 6: Ohio State leaps into playoff
December 20
Bahamas Bowl: Florida Atlantic vs. Toledo
2 p.m. ET, ESPN – Nassau, Bahamas
Frisco Bowl: SMU vs. MTSU*
7:30 p.m. ET, ESPN2 – Frisco, Texas
December 21
New Mexico Bowl: Marshall vs. Wyoming
2 p.m. ET, ESPN – Albuquerque, N.M.
Cure Bowl: Temple vs. Arkansas State
2:30 p.m. ET, CBS Sports Network – Orlando, Fla.
Boca Raton Bowl: Miami (OH) vs. East Carolina
3:30 p.m. ET, ABC – Boca Raton, Fla.
Camellia Bowl: Troy vs. Eastern Michigan
5:30 p.m. ET, ESPN – Montgomery, Ala.
Las Vegas Bowl: Washington State vs. Hawaii
7:30 p.m. ET, ABC – Las Vegas, Nev.
New Orleans Bowl: Appalachian State vs. Louisiana Tech
9 p.m. ET, ESPN – New Orleans, La.
The Skinny
Who wants to win the C-USA? I’ve projected Marshall and North Texas at different points of the season so far as the C-USA winner, but both have shown some obvious flaws. The Thundering Herd were routed at home in a big Group of Five matchup with Cincinnati this week, and North Texas lost by three touchdowns to a D’Eriq King-less Houston team in Denton.
Last year’s C-USA champion UAB dropped a game to Western Kentucky. Louisiana Tech and Southern Miss look like legitimate contenders, but for now I’m going with Lane Kiffin’s Florida Atlantic as the favorite. Remember, the C-USA champion chooses the bowl game it wants to go to among the pool of its conference tie-ins.
With only a loss to Washington and a pair of wins over other Pac-12 teams, Hawaii is still alive in the Groupof Five race for a New Year’s Six berth. The Rainbow Warriors will need some help from all the other group-of-five teams suffering a loss, but if so a one-loss Hawaii is likely to have the best resume of the bunch.
Hawaii gets a week off before traveling to the Smurf Turf to battle Boise State in a massive Mountain West showdown. The Mountain West champion is auto-assigned to the Las Vegas Bowl unless the champion ends up as the top ranked Group of Five.