Losing the Apple Cup leaves the Cougars losing some of their bowl appeal

The bowl picture won’t clear up entirely until the College Football Playoff makes its selections next weekend, but after Washington State’s Apple Cup defeat against the Huskies on Friday, the Cougars face long odds in getting to the Alamo Bowl, and have diminished their chances of getting a Holiday Bowl berth.

It’s unlikely, though, that they’ll fall past the Foster Farms Bowl.

Eric Graves, a Holiday Bowl selection committee member, was at Husky Stadium on Friday and said the committee was very enthusiastic about Washington State and Oregon and was waiting to see how the final weekend of the regular season played out.

“It’ll come down to their final records, and if it’s a matter of head-to-head record, WSU beat Oregon at home,” Graves said before kickoff Friday.

Graves also said the Holiday Bowl is leaning toward either Wisconsin or Northwestern as its Big Ten representative.

But the way WSU lost to Washington, coupled with Oregon’s victory over Oregon State, seems to have had an impact on the Holiday Bowl’s stance.

Asked Saturday morning whether WSU’s defeat had hurt the Cougars’ chances of getting to the Holiday Bowl on Dec. 30 in San Diego, Graves said, “Yes.”

“I kind of sense we’ll be down to Oregon and Washington State depending on who takes whom. We were all thinking it was going to be Washington State, but that was a pretty tough loss yesterday,” Graves said. “Oregon is going to have a better conference record even though Washington State beat them in Eugene.”

Oregon finished the regular season 9-3 overall, and 7-2 in the Pac-12 North. WSU is 8-4 and 6-3.

Oregon went into the week No. 17 in the College Football Playoff rankings, while WSU was ranked 20th, but after the defeat against the Huskies, there’s a strong chance WSU might fall out of the next installment of rankings when they are released Tuesday.

Because of the way Pac-12 teams have beat up on each other this year, the Alamo Bowl isn’t mathematically out of the picture yet. WSU finished with three conference defeats, and the only two Pac-12 teams with fewer conference losses are Oregon and Stanford (10-2 overall, 8-1 Pac-12).

If Stanford gets upset in the Pac-12 championship game and does not get to go to the Rose Bowl, the Cardinal becomes the front-runner for an Alamo Bowl bid. But if Stanford does end up in the Rose Bowl as most pundits believe it will, the Alamo Bowl can then select from an Oregon team with two conference defeats, or any other three-loss Pac-12 team.

Washington State would be in that mix, and the Cougars have Mike Leach going for them -- the Alamo Bowl likes the idea of bringing Leach back to Texas.

“Technically, (the Cougars) are still in the hunt,” Alamo Bowl representative Jack Rogers said Saturday. “We pick on conferences wins/losses, and we look at a lot of things. Of all those three-loss teams, who do we think is the best football team? Are they marquee teams for TV? Who do we put them up against on the Big 12 side, how does the team travel, and what’s the general overall attitude of fans? That’s why we go out every week to games.

“Rankings help, too. We’d probably take a 14th-ranked team over a 20th-ranked team.”

The Alamo Bowl also is, however, believed to be very hot on USC. The Trojans are a marquee team with a large fan following, and they have never played in the Alamo Bowl.

“I have a feeling the Alamo Bowl will take USC if they can,” Graves said.

In that scenario, the Cougars could fall to the Foster Farms Bowl in Santa Clara, Calif., or the Sun Bowl in El Paso, Texas. Both games will be played Dec. 26.

But WSU’s worst-case scenario might be the Foster Farms Bowl, which makes its selection right after the Alamo and Holiday Bowls and before the Sun Bowl.

Foster Farms Bowl Executive Director Gary Cavalli said Saturday his committee has watched the Cougars closely this year.

“We would certainly be interested in the Cougars,” Cavalli said. “You want a motivated fan base, and with the Cougars, that’s one of the plusses. You always want the team that’s an overachiever, and I think a lot of people feel that Washington State overachieved and the fan base is excited.”

This story was originally published November 30, 2015 at 10:21 AM with the headline "Losing the Apple Cup leaves the Cougars losing some of their bowl appeal."