NEW YEAR’S BOWL PREVIEWS

HAPPY NEW YEAR, ALL. May 2020 be your best year yet. Let’s watch some football.

Citrus Bowl | Michigan vs Alabama | Noon | ABC

by Shooter

At some point we all have to admit the honest brutal truth. College football fandom requires honesty. Hello everyone, my name is Shooter, and I’ve been a Michigan Wolverines fan for the last 30 years. It’s hard to explain. I did not grow up in an A&M household.

SMU was the only team I cared about, and after the Death Penalty, I was lost in the wilderness. I was 15 and let’s all admit that 15 year old boys are idiots. But those games against Ohio State reeled me in. It was everything I wanted at that age...tradition, history, classic uniforms, loose Midwestern women that liked to smoke cigarettes. Over time, it has not faded. Every weekend I still have a bizarre emotional interest in Michigan games.

I am not an “S-E-C” bro. Fuck everyone else in the conference. I hope they turn to shit. Fuck LSU, I hope Clemson burns them to the ground. I will not be rooting for any of our conference mates in bowl season ever. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Unless it’s Texas, because fuck them too.

Okay, I’m rambling, but let’s sum this up. I love Michigan. Fuck Alabama. Go Blue.

Outback Bowl | Auburn vs. Minnesota | noon | ESPN

by Rush

I am not an “S-E-C” bro. Fuck everyone else in the conference. I hope they turn to shit. Fuck LSU, I hope Clemson burns them to the ground. I will not be rooting for any of our conference mates in bowl season ever. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Unless it’s Texas, because fuck them too.

Shooter, you are speaking my language. This is now a B1G > SEC post.

I grew up going to a small Lutheran church in the Hill Country. There were always a healthy number of Minnesotans in attendance: snowbirds, Air Force retirees who moved out from the city, or just good folks who wound up there. Minnesotans are kind, generous, and quick to laugh, even at themselves. They love good food and drink. I work with Minnesotans. My friendliest neighbor is a die hard Golden Gopher. For all these reasons, it’s delighted me to see Minnesota have such a historic season this year. For a local equivalent, it’d be like watching Rice field the best G5 team and flirt with a top-ten ranking.

Minnesota, please beat Auburn. Be more blessed, fortuitous, and downright blind lucky than Auburn, a team who makes a living being all three. Row your boats or whatever and don’t stop for the Gus Bus. Beat Auburn, scarf down some lutefisk, crack a sixer of Bud Heavy tallboys out in the ice shed, and smile with appreciation. Magic seasons are something special.

Rose Bowl | Wisconsin vs. Oregon | 4pm | ESPN

by Shooter

I’ll just get out of the way and let Keith Jackson introduce this game for us...

Sugar Bowl | Georgia vs. Baylor | 7:45 p.m. | ESPN

by Rush

What is it, exactly, that we have done?

What has the entire college football population done in 2019 to anger the Scheduling Gods on high, lounging demurely in a cloudbank in Bristol, CT at ESPN HQ? Not only are there a mere FOUR bowl games on NEW YEAR’S DAY. Not only are two of those four games aired SIMULTANEOUSLY. No, no, my friends. Not only all those things, but this thing too: the prime time game is this. Baylor versus Georgia.

College football’s pariah against college football’s perennial choke artist. A head coach who wears a middle school arts and crafts class smock on the sideline paired up with a head coach who sports the haircut of a nine year old and frames it with a visor. Legions of smug Baptists and legions of smug golf pricks rewarded undeservedly with a trip to America’s most decadent city. Sugar Bowl? Nay, more like Pile Of Stale Sweet N Low Packets From 1991 You Found In A Closet Somewhere Bowl. Gluten Free Stevia Bowl. Sodium Saccharin Ass Bowl Game. None of the calories and none of the flavor. First team to accidentally score 15 points wins. The worst part? We’ve all got to go back to work tomorrow morning. Happy New Year!