At 4-6, Huskies need wins in final two games to reach bowl eligibility

As disappointing as recent games have been for the Washington Huskies, they are still within reach of a goal that some observers figured they might not be able to achieve this season.

At 4-6 overall, with two remaining games, the Huskies’ bowl prospects are simple: They have to win Saturday at Oregon State and Nov. 27 against Washington State in the Apple Cup to assure bowl eligibility.

This issue is actually a little more complicated than usual.

College football teams are supposed to finish with a record of 6-6 or better to qualify to play in a bowl game. But it appears increasingly likely that there will not be enough teams with such a record to fill the 80 available spots.

ESPN reported Tuesday that nobody is really sure how the bowls would go about selecting five-win teams if they’re needed.

So the Huskies actually might have a small chance of playing in a bowl game even if they don’t finish 6-6.

And while nobody associated with the UW program would necessarily deem a .500 record successful, expectations for this young Huskies team were relatively low before the season started.

A trip to a bowl game would not only grant them several additional practices, but it would be an indication of progress, coach Chris Petersen said.

“ If that happens, it means we’re trending upward,” Petersen said. “We’re playing better football, we’re winning. I think that’s probably the most important thing when I think about a bowl situation. That’s the critical part there.”

The Huskies are also trying to maintain their streak of consecutive bowl appearances, which is in jeopardy of ending at five (2010-14).

It’s currently the third-longest bowl streak in UW history, behind the nine-year streak from 1979-87 and an eight-season stretch from 1995-2002 (though the Huskies went from 1977 through 2003 without a losing record).

Travis Feeney, a fifth-year senior linebacker, said a bowl appearance in his final collegiate season “would mean everything to me.”

“That’s the whole goal,” he said. “The whole goal is to get to a bowl game. The whole goal is definitely, as a senior, get to a bowl game. That’s all the senior class wants. That’s all we want to do, is win one game at a time.”

This story was originally published November 17, 2015 at 9:39 PM with the headline "At 4-6, Huskies need wins in final two games to reach bowl eligibility."