The most comprehensive analysis of the college football bowl bubble is back!  For the twelfth season, I will be publishing weekly late season columns analyzing which teams will get bowl bids and which will not.  Below, I have written a report for every team that has yet to be declared either bowl eligible or ineligible.  Each week this list will be updated and new odds will be provided for each team.  Please note that these odds only represent the chances that a particular team will get enough wins to be eligible to receive a bowl bid.  They do not represent the odds a team has for actually receiving a bid.  This discrepancy likely won’t affect the bowl chances for most teams, but as we have seen in years past, sometimes a squad can fall short of bowl eligibility and still garner a bowl bid at 5-7 based on APR, if all spots are not filled.  All of the teams below are ordered in descending order of likelihood that they will become bowl eligible.  As of now, there are 22 teams on the list with 7 predicted to attain bowl eligibility and 15 predicted to fall short.  As of now, I’m projecting there to be 79 bowl eligible teams for 2021 (see full stats at the bottom of this entry).  Keep in mind that there are a total of 82 bowl slots to be filled, so at this point, I am predicting there to be 3 bowl bids which would have to be filled by teams with a 5-7 record.  This list is updated through all games played on November 13th. 

Good Side of the Bowl Bubble: Teams closing in on bowl bids (7):

West Virginia- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: at Kansas; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 80% (previous odds: 47%, 40%)

Florida Atlantic- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: vs. Middle Tennessee; 68% Odds of Bowl Eligibility: (previous odds: 87%, 73%)

Memphis- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: vs. Tulane; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 65% (previous odds: 91%, 70%) 

Ball State- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: vs. Buffalo; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 59% (previous odds: 63%, 62%) 

Florida- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: vs. Florida State; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 57% (previous odds: 83%, 84%)

Charlotte- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: at Old Dominion; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 56% (previous odds: 70%, 60%)

Maryland- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: at Rutgers; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 52% (previous odds: 52%, 54%)

——————————————————————————————

Bad Side of the Bowl Bubble: Teams who will likely be home for the holidays (15):

Rutgers- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: vs. Maryland; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 48% (previous odds: 40%, 49%)

Southern Cal- Record: 4-6; Remaining Schedule: vs. BYU, at California; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 45% (previous odds: 51%, 51%)

Old Dominion- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: vs. Charlotte; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 44% (previous odds: 11%, 33%)

Florida State- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: vs. Florida; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 43%  (previous odds: 8%, 27%)

Virginia Tech- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: at Virginia; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 42% (previous odds: 45%, 46%)

Syracuse- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: vs. Pittsburgh; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 35% (previous odds: 49%, 36%)

LSU- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: vs. Texas A & M; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 34% (previous odds: 44%, 31%)

Troy- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: at Georgia State; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 33% (previous odds: 43%, 34%)

Middle Tennessee- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: at Florida Atlantic; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 32% (previous odds: 64%, 65%) 

San Jose State- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: vs. Fresno State; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 31% (previous odds: 48%, 32%)

Tulsa- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: at SMU; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 30% (previous odds: 20%, 22%)

South Alabama- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: vs. Coastal Carolina; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 27% (previous odds: 7%, 25%)

TCU- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: at Iowa State; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 24% (previous odds: 22%, 21%)

North Texas- Record: 5-6; Remaining Schedule: vs. UTSA; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 22% (previous odds: 9%, 20%)

California- Record: 4-6; Remaining Schedule: at UCLA, vs. Southern Cal; Odds of Bowl Eligibility: 19% (previous odds: 10%, 10%)

—————————————————————————————————————

Already Bowl Eligible (72):  (1) Clemson, (2) NC State, (3) Pittsburgh, (4) Virginia, (5) Wake Forest, (6) Cincinnati, (7) Houston, (8) SMU, (9), UCF, (10) Iowa, (11) Michigan, (12) Michigan State, (13) Minnesota, (14) Ohio State, (15) Penn State, (16) Purdue, (17) Wisconsin, (18) Baylor, (19) Iowa State, (20) Kansas State, (21) Oklahoma, (22) Oklahoma State, (23) Marshall, (24) UAB, (25) UTEP, (26) UTSA, (27) Eastern Michigan, (28) Northern Illinois, (29) Air Force, (30) Fresno State, (31) Nevada, (32) San Diego State, (33) Utah State, (34) Arizona State, (35) Oregon, (36) Utah, (37) Alabama, (38) Arkansas, (39) Auburn, (40) Georgia, (41) Kentucky, (42) Ole Miss, (43) Texas A &M, (44) Appalachian State, (45) Coastal Carolina, (46) UL-Lafayettte, (47) BYU, (48) Liberty, (49) Notre Dame, (50) Western Michigan (previous odds: 94%), (51) Central Michigan (previous odds: 66%), (52) Boise State (previous odds: 96%), (53) Army (previous odds: 99.5%), (54) Mississippi State (previous odds: 99%), (55) East Carolina (previous odds: 57%), (56) UCLA (previous odds: 92%), (57) Western Kentucky (previous odds: 68%), (58) Boston College (previous odds: 62%), (59) Oregon State (previous odds: 58%), (60) Texas Tech (previous odds: 38%), (61) Toledo (previous odds: 90%, 94%), (62) Miami-OH (previous odds: 60%, 81%), (63) Louisville (previous odds: 53%, 75%), (64) Washington State (previous odds: 81%, 79%), (65) North Carolina (previous odds: 98%, 96%), (66) Kent State (previous odds: 85%, 83%), (67) Georgia State (previous odds: 61%, 85%), (68) Tennessee (previous odds: 97%, 95%), (69) Miami-FL (previous odds: 79%, 78%), (70) Wyoming (previous odds: 67%, 66%), (71) Missouri (previous odds: 21%, 37%), (72) South Carolina (previous odds: 42%, 23%)

Already Ineligible for a Bowl Game (36):  (1) Navy, (2) South Florida, (3) Tulane, (4) Indiana, (5) Nebraska, (6) Kansas, (7) FIU, (8) Louisiana Tech, (9) Southern Miss, (10) Akron, (11) Ohio, (12) UNLV, (13) Arizona, (14) Vanderbilt, (15) Arkansas State, (16) Georgia Southern, (17) New Mexico State (18) UConn, (19) UMass, (20) Bowling Green (previous odds, 16%), (21) Northwestern (previous odds: 3%), (22) Temple (previous odds: 2%), (23) Colorado State (previous odds: 27%), (24) Rice (previous odds: 25%), (25) Hawaii (previous odds: 24%), (26) Stanford (previous odds: 12%), (27) Colorado (previous odds: 6%), (28) Duke (previous odds: 4%), (29) Texas State (previous odds: 1.5%), (30) Georgia Tech (previous odds: 1%), (31) New Mexico (previous odds: 0.5%), (32) Buffalo (previous odds: 31%, 16%), (33) Texas (previous odds: 78%, 52%), (34) Illinois (previous odds: 14%, 14%), (35) Washington (previous odds: 59%, 53%), (36) UL-Monroe (previous odds: 5%, 1%)

—————————————————————————————————-

Current Stats:

Already Bowl Eligible: 72

Predicted to be Bowl Eligible: 7 (79)

Already Ineligible for a Bowl Game: 36

Predicted not to become Bowl Eligible: 15 (51)