Northern Illinois in the Orange Bowl?

[dal4018]

How absurd. I know the Orange Bowl people are going to try to put a happy face on this but they've got to be pretty pissed off. Or whoever gets this dog. They lose to 4-8 Iowa. They beat 1-11 Kansas by 7. And they're going to a BCS Bowl because they won the pathetic MAC.

Me, I wish there was no such thing as college bowls and college football at all levels just had playoffs like very other level of football does.

Yes the Orange bowl ppl are upset at NIU they told them they were not wanted!!!

[UNI88]

before the games were played NIU was just as or more deserving of a BCS bid than Louisville

Meh. The Big East isn't anything to write home about, but it's certainly stronger than the MAC. NIU beat 2-10 Army, 1-11 Kansas and non-playoff UT-M, and lost to a 4-8 Iowa team in their OOC schedule. Hard to make a case they were more deserving.

Nice job taking Wisconsin out and focusing just on Louisville. NIU's OOC schedule wasn't great but they went undefeated in the MAC and the MAC was the strongest it's been in years. I don't have the details in front of me but they won a record number of games against teams from BCS conferences including wins against Penn St and other good teams. The BE might be better than the MAC but it isn't by that much. The BE is also trending down while the MAC appears to be trending up.

I also don't hold it against NIU or the MAC that they got to where they were within the rules. That bowl bid will be huge for them going forward - they got a lot of money and received a lot of press which will help their recruiting. They can leverage these to get better

[UNI88]

NIU deserved to get in based on the rules; however outside of that not so much.

And neither did Louisville or Wisconsin or the UConn team that got pummeled by Oklahoma a few years ago. If they took the 10 most deserving teams, there would have been 5-6 SEC teams playing in BCS bowls.