Hey folks, welcome to… probably the last edition ever of bowl predictions? I’ve been at this since 1999. (“all 23 Division I-A bowls”, how quaint!) The explosion of bowl games made this harder, but at least until the last few years there were rules. It’s been harder, but at least I still had some things to go on. However, the expansion of the playoff to 24 teams next year will drastically re-shape the bowl landscape.

To give you an idea, these are the teams I essentially had on my playoff bubble based on my predictions for the rest of the season:

• Alabama
• Mississippi
• Houston
• Wake Forest
• Iowa
• New Mexico

Suffice it to say, I didn’t really bother trying to figure out the other 8 teams to get to 24. This expansion will kill off the current top tier of bowl games. I doubt conference tie-ins will be a thing after this. The bowls are trying to save themselves, but it’s still unclear for what. I suspect the ESPN Events bowls, especially ones that already mostly or only invite G6 teams, will continue. I guess we can see what that’s going to look like when we get there next offseason,

As far as this season goes, this weekend will go a long way toward setting the final top 12. More on that in the next post. For now, here’s the 2026 predictions. I had to use 4 5-7 teams (indicated by the “^^”).