NCAA Waives Wins Requirement for Football Bowl Games This Season

Previously, college football teams needed to win six games to be bowl eligible, but with shortened seasons in 2020, the NCAA has waved that requirement.

With most of the major conferences playing condensed football seasons this fall, the NCAA had decided to waive the wins requirement to play in a bowl game this season. That means any of the 127 FBS teams can play in a game.

At present, there are 39 bowl games, including the first round of the College Football Playoff. So 78 teams will earn bowl bids.

Good news: all 127 FBS teams playing this fall are immediately bowl eligible as NCAA officially approves no win requirements to play in a bowl, sources told @Stadium. Bad news: only 78 teams are needed to fill 39 bowls this year

— Brett McMurphy (@Brett_McMurphy) October 14, 2020

That's good news for schools like Indiana, a team that's playing a conference-only schedule when the Big Ten season starts on Oct. 24. The Big Ten is playing eight scheduled games, plus a ninth game on the weekend of the conference title game.

In previous years when teams were allowed to play 12-game schedules, a minimum of six wins was required to be eligible for a bowl game, which meant a .500 record or better. With shortened seasons and more difficult schedules, getting eligible for many teams would have been hard.

Indiana, for instance, is a likely underdog in four games this season (Penn State, Michigan, Ohio State and Wisconsin), though a few of those lines might be pretty small. Indiana, which was 8-5 a year ago, winning eight games for the first time in 26 years, earned a trip to the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl in Jacksonville, where they lost to Tennessee.

The plan, for now, is that the College Football Playoff selection committee will select its four teams on Sunday, Dec. 20, and the bowl selections will soon follow.

Indiana begins its season at home on Saturday, Oct. 24 against No. 9 Penn State. The game kicks off at 3:30 p.m. ET 

Related stories on Indiana football

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• INDIANA DEFENSE STEPS UP: Hoosiers defensive coordinator Kane Wommack thinks IU's defense can be a top-25 group this season. CLICK HERE
• PENN STATE GAME PERSONAL FOR WHOP PHILYOR: Whop Philyor was taken out of last year's Penn State game on a helmet-to-helmet hit. This year's season-opener means more to the Indiana receiver. CLICK HERE
• KAHLIL BENSON OUT FOR SEASON: True freshman Kahlil Benson is out for the season with a torn ACL. CLICK HERE