These Aren’t Exactly the Bowl System’s Salad Days

All told, between Tuesday and Jan. 4, we’re talking: 56 teams, 28 bowl games, five Mid-American Conference schools (but none from the state of Nebraska), future NFL Europe players preening for cameras, empty backfields and empty seats.

A few of these games will bowl you over; most will not.

As always, in offering our worst-to-best assessments, viewer discretion is extremely advised.

28. Fort Worth: Cincinnati (6-5) vs. Marshall (6-5). This is Cincinnati’s reward for giving up 70 points to Louisville in its last game? Both schools leave forwarding addresses -- Cincinnati moves to the Big East next year and Marshall joins the NFC West.

27. Champs Sports: Syracuse (6-5) vs. Georgia Tech (6-5). Nothing like two out-of-state, 6-5 schools hammering it out for 60 minutes in an Orlando ambience.

26. Silicon Valley: Troy (7-4) vs. Northern Illinois (8-3). A game like this comes along only every decade or so -- thank goodness.

25. Music City: Alabama (6-5) vs. Minnesota (6-5). Foreign-language interpreters will be provided for fan bases from vastly different cultural and historical backgrounds.

24. Las Vegas: UCLA (6-5) vs. Wyoming (6-5). UCLA slowly working its way up the Pac-10 food bowl chain (Silicon Valley ... Las Vegas

23. Hawaii: Hawaii (7-5) vs. Alabama Birmingham (7-4). Vacation-destination bowl is a well-deserved, season-ending reward for a team that did everything the coach asked. Alabama Birmingham players will enjoy the game also.

22. New Orleans: North Texas (7-4) vs. Southern Mississippi (6-5). Mack Brown says North Texas deserves a berth in bowl championship series if it defeats Southern Mississippi.

21. Motor City: Toledo (9-3) vs. Connecticut (7-4). Just the pick-me-up Detroit needs after the ugly Piston-Pacer incident.

20. Independence: Miami (Ohio) (8-4) vs. Iowa State (6-5). No truth to the rumor South Carolina players picked a fight with Clemson players just to stay out of this game.

19. GMAC: Memphis (8-3) vs. Bowling Green (8-3). Bob Dylan foresaw the pitfalls of this matchup when he wrote the song, “Stuck Inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again.”

18. MPC Computers: Fresno State (8-3) vs. Virginia (8-3). Boise on Dec. 27. In the span of a month, Virginia goes from playing for the national title to playing on a blue field.

17. Houston: Colorado (7-5) vs. Texas El Paso (8-3): Matchup of coaches, Gary Barnett and Mike Price, who survived emotional off-the-field scandals. Barbara Walters comes out of retirement to handle the sideline reports.

16. Alamo: Ohio State (7-4) vs. Oklahoma State (7-4). Halftime show to include Maurice Clarett dotting the “I” in Script Ohio as he recites possible NCAA sanctions levied against the football program.

15. Continental Tire: Boston College (8-3) vs. North Carolina (6-5). Real reason Tom O’Brien turned down the Washington job: He just couldn’t pass up this rubber-meets-the-road showcase.

14. Emerald: Navy (9-2) vs. New Mexico (7-4). Planners caught off guard when Navy traveling party takes shortcut through Panama Canal and arrives at bowl three weeks early.

13. Sun: Arizona State (8-3) vs. Purdue (7-4). Purdue quarterback Kyle Orton wonders how he went from Heisman Trophy favorite to eating a two-taco combo plate.

12. Insight: Oregon State (6-5) vs. Notre Dame (6-5). Utah Coach Urban Meyer stops by practice to coach Irish for one day “just to see what it would have felt like.”

11. Peach: Miami (8-3) vs. Florida (7-4). Don’t worry if you miss this game; schools are scheduled to meet in the regular season in 2008.

10. Outback: Georgia (9-2) vs. Wisconsin (9-2). Heisman winners Herschel Walker and Ron Dayne slated to square off in halftime mud-wrestling match.

9. Holiday: California (10-1) vs. Texas Tech (7-4). The last team that entered this game moping because it didn’t get into a BCS game played like sailors coming off furlough. That team was Texas.

8. Cotton: Texas A&M; (7-4) vs. Tennessee (9-3). It’s a 10 a.m. Central Time start so the biggest issue may be cotton mouth.

7. Gator: Florida State (8-3) vs. West Virginia (8-3). One heart-tugging story line recalls the time West Virginia fans hanged Bobby Bowden in effigy when he was coaching in Morgantown from 1970 to ’75.

6. Capital One: Iowa (9-2) vs. Louisiana State (9-2). Kirk Ferentz and Nick Saban meet before game to chuckle about how much money they made simply by floating their names for the Notre Dame job.

5. Fiesta: Utah (11-0) vs. Pittsburgh (8-3). P.A. announcer’s worst nightmare: “And now, please welcome to the field Utah and Florida Coach Urban Meyer and Pittsburgh and Stanford Coach Walt Harris.”

4. Rose: Texas (10-1) vs. Michigan (9-2). USDA.com chat room reports Bevo is suffering from “turf hoof” and may not be able to march in Rose Parade.

3. Sugar: Auburn (12-0) vs. Virginia Tech (10-2). Tigers positively looking forward to capping a 13-0 season in which they will not win the national title and their players will get hosed out of all major awards.

2. Liberty: Louisville (10-1) vs. Boise State (11-0). In a surprise move before kickoff, Bobby Petrino is named the next Boise State coach and Dan Hawkins signs new deal at Louisville. Both coaches agree to coach their former teams through the bowl game.

1. Orange: USC (12-0) vs. Oklahoma (12-0). Dear Auburn: Wow, what a bowl!

Don’t wish you were here.