2013 College Football Bowl Schedule and Weekend Open Thread

Get ready for the top 70 teams, 34 bowls, and 1 National Championship Game. Yes that's right, 34 bowls. I remember when I was a kid, it seemed like there were only a handful of bowl games and they were all on January 1^st. Well times have changed and a team only needs to win 6 games to get invited to a bowl game. For those who love to watch college football, this might be good news. But it seems to take a little of the thrill out of it for me. Non-the-less, I am glad that our Bruins are headed to a bowl game on New Year's Eve (and if you're in L.A. and interested in joining other bners for the game, check out Mexi's post). You can catch up on all of our coverage as our Bruins prepare for the Sun Bowl here.

Sbnation has a great interactive bowl calendar where you can get a great look at all of the dates, places, and corporate names! There are actually a few bowls still up for grabs e.g. the Texas Bowl and I was thinking maybe we should sponsor one. "The Bruinnation.com Texas Bowl", wouldn't that be awesome! On the site, the sbnation crew has their picks and links to their analysis of each bowl game plus articles from the teams blogs. This week gets started with the "famous" Royal Purple, Gildan, Potato, and the R & L Carrier Bowls! And for those of you still hungry, the beef bowl will be on Monday. You will have to wait until Friday for the Hunger Bowl (is that an oxymoron?). I think it would be cool if they organized the bowl dates by sponsor. I mean the potato bowl and beef bowl might make for a really great meal. Achilles has the best run down of the bowl games I've seen anywhere where you can also make your bowl guesses.  I particularly appreciated his take on the synthetic lubricant bowl (Royal Purple) so suited to both Las Vegas and Southern Cal.

The Pac-12 bowl season gets off to an early start this year featuring Washington State and U$C on Satuday in the Gildan New Mexico Bowl and the Royal Purple Las Vegas Bowl respectfully.   Washington State takes on Colorado State at 11 am (PT).  The mess over at Southern Cal hopefully will manifest on the field with the very together Fresno State kicking Southern Cal's proverbial booty beginning at 12:30 pacific time.  The "experts" are split on their picks in the Royal Purple Bowl, but I'm hoping for a shellacking of the trogans.   Go  Bulldogs!  Oregon State gets to go to Hawaii to play on Tuesday and Washington coached by fill in the blank plays on Friday in the Fight Hunger Bowl.  For a complete schedule and things to know about Pac-12 bowl games check out the sbnation coverage here.

Let us know what games you are looking forward to, who you will be rooting for, your favorite bowl names, and comments during the games here.

Below is the complete schedule of bowl games (all times pacific time), with links to sbnation coverage of each game: (* Pac-12 games)

Saturday, December 21^st:

• * Colorado St. vs. Washington St., Gildan New Mexico Bowl, 11am, ESPN *
• * #20 Fresno St. vs. #25 Southern Cal, Royal Purple Las Vegas Bowl, 12:30 pm, ABC*
• Buffalo goes against San Diego St. in the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl at 2:30 pm, ESPN
• Louisiana-Lafayette plays Tulane at 6pm in R+L Carriers Bowl (New Orleans), ESPN

Monday, December 23^nd

• Ohio Bobcats vs. East Carolina,  in the Beef O'Brady Bowl (St. Petersburg), 11am, ESPN

Tuesday, December 24^th:

• *Oregon State gets to go to Hawaii for a match up between Boise State.  5 pm, Sheraton Hawaii Bowl,ESPN. *

Wednesday: Merry Christmas!

Thursday, December 26th:

• Little Caesar's Bowl in Detroit, Bowling Green vs. Pitt, 3pm, ESPN and
• The San Diego Credit Union Bowl, Utah State vs. Northern Illinois, 6:30, ESPN.

Friday, December 27th :

• The Military Bowl presented by Northrup Grumman: Maryland vs. Marshall, 11:30 am, ESPN.
• Minnesota vs. Syracuse in the Texas Bowl, 3pm, ESPN.
• * Washington vs. BYU in the Fight Hunger Bowl, 6:30, ESPN. This will be the first FBS game with multiple female officials. Come on women, make us proud! *

Saturday, December 28^th:

• Rutgers vs. Notre Dame, New Era Pinstripe Bowl, 9 am, ESPN
• Cincinnati vs. North Carolina, Belk Bowl, 12:20 pm, ESPN
• Miami (FL) vs. #18 Louisville, Russell Athletic Bowl, 3:45, ESPN
• Michigan vs. Kansas State, 7:15 pm, Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl, ESPN

Monday, December 30^th:

• Middle Tennessee vs Navy, Bell Helicopter Armed Forces Bowl, 8:45 am, ESPN
• Ole Miss vs. Georgia Tech, Franklin American Mortgage Music City Bowl, 12:15 pm, ESPN
• * #10 Oregon vs. Texas, Valero Alamo Bowl, 3:45 pm, ESPN *
• * #14 Arizona State vs. Texas Tech, National University Holiday Bowl, 7:15 pm, ESPN *

Tuesday, December 31^st:

• * Arizona vs. Boston College, AdvoCare V100 Bowl, 9:30 am, ESPN *
• ***Virginia Tech vs. #17 UCLA, Hyundai Sun Bowl, 11am, CBS ***
• Rice vs. Mississippi State, AutoZone Liberty Bowl, 1pm, ESPN
• #24 Duke vs. No 21 Texas A&M, Chick-fil-A Bowl, 5pm, ESPN

Wednesday, January 1^st: Happy New Years Bruins!

• Nebraska vs. #22 Georgia, Taxslayer.com Gator Bowl, 9am, ESPN2, Go Huskers!
• UNLV vs. North Texas, Heart of Dallas Bowl, Pres. By Plainscapital Bank, 9am, ESPNU
• #19 Wisnonsin vs. #9 South Carolina, Capital One Bowl, 10am, ABC
• Iowa vs. #16 LSU, Outback Bowl, 10am, ESPN
• * #5 Stanford vs #4 Michigan State, Rose Bowl Pres. By Vizio, 2pm, ESPN (seriously this isn't on ABC?)
• #15 UCF vs. #6 Baylor, Tostitos Fiesta Bowl, 5:30pm, ESPN

Thursday, January 2^nd:

• #3 Alabama vs. #11 Oklahoma, Allstate Sugar Bowl, 5:30; ESPN

Friday, January 3rd:

• #13 Oklahoma State vs. #8 Missouri, AT&T Cotton Bowl, 4:30, Fox
• #12 Clemson vs. #7 Ohio State, Discover Orange Bowl, 5:30, ESPN

Saturday, January 4^th:

• Vanderbilt vs Houston, BBVA Compass Bowl, 10am, ESPN

Sunday, January 5^th:

• Arkansas State vs. Ball State, Godaddy Bowl, 6pm, ESPN

Monday, January 6^th:

• #1 Florida State vs. #2 Auburn: Vizio BCS National Championship, 5:30pm, ESPN.

Have a great Holiday Season and enjoy!