Cal Sports Report

Cal's Chance to Play in Gator Bowl Disappears. What If Another Bowl Vacancy Arises?

If another bowl team withdraws because of COVID, would Cal be invited as a replacement? Would the Bears accept?

Jake Curtis

Cal's Chance to Play in Gator Bowl Disappears. What If Another Bowl Vacancy Arises?
Cal's Chance to Play in Gator Bowl Disappears. What If Another Bowl Vacancy Arises? /

Rutgers accepted an invitation to replace Texas A&M in the Gator Bowl, ending speculation that Cal might have a chance to play in that bowl.

Rutgers' participation in the Gator Bowl was approved on Thursday, and the Scarlet Knights will face Wake Forest in the Dec. 31 bowl game in Jacksonville, Fla.

But what if another bowl has a team withdraw because of COVID issues? Would Cal, which finished 5-7, consider accepting an invitation to that bowl?

On Wednesday, Texas A&M has had to pull out of the Gator Bowl game against Wake Forest because of COVID issues. With not enough bowl-eligible teams available, Gator Bowl officials were able to offer a berth to a 5-7 team. Like Cal, for example.

On Wednesday night it was reported Rutgers (5-7) would accept an invitation to replace Texas A&M, and on Thursday the NCAA Oversight Committee approved Rutgers' acceptance of the bowl bid.

The other option was to invite a team that has already played a bowl game. But the Gator Bowl decided to go with Rutgers, which went 5-7 in the regular season.

When not enough bowl-eligible teams are available, bowls can invite teams with 5-7 records based on their Academic Progress Report (APR).  In other words, the 5-7 team with the best APR would get the first shot at a bowl berth.  Rutgers was at the top of the APR list, and had the first shot at a bowl berth.

By our calculations Cal has the next best APR after Rutgers among teams that finished with a 5-7 record, just ahead of Texas and Illinois. So if another bowl has a team withdraw for COVID reasons, that bowl might offer the vacated spot to Cal.  At least that's one scenario, although bowl officials and the NCAA may get creative if more bowl vacancies arise.

But even if Cal is offered a berth in a bowl, it's hard to see how the Bears could accept.  The Golden Bears have not played since Dec. 4, and have not had a team practice since. Cal students just completed taking finals for the fall term last week, and the spring term does not begin until January 11. Getting enough players back on campus and giving them sufficient practice time to play in a postseason game would be a major challenge. 

That did not prevented several prominent Cal players from retweeting on Wednesday the speculation as it pertained to Cal being a possible Gator Bowl team:

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Cover photo by Melina Vastola, USA TODAY Sports

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Jake Curtis
JAKE CURTIS

Jake Curtis worked in the San Francisco Chronicle sports department for 27 years, covering virtually every sport, including numerous Final Fours, several college football national championship games, an NBA Finals, world championship boxing matches and a World Cup. He was a Cal beat writer for many of those years, and won awards for his feature stories.

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