Welcome back sports fans and Merry Christmas to all who celebrate. We at the GCR will be traveling tomorrow so we are going to have our preview for tomorrow’s games today.
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First a recap of an amazing Hawaii Bowl which saw California (7-5/58) jump to a second quarter 21-0 lead against the home team Rainbow Warriors (8-4/68). As the GCR predicted a Golden Bears upset over favored Hawaii, things looked good. A touchdown and a field goal within 3:30 brought the score to a comfortable 21-10 at the half. We had had a long day and went to bed early, which was foolish, because while the 3rd was just so-so (Hawaii scored the lone points with a FG to trail 21-13), the 4th saw 32 points scored between the two teams with the home team accounting for 22 of them (a 2-pt conversion to tie at 21 then two more touches later). Hawaii at 1.5 favorites won and covered causing the GCR to lose both yesterday.
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Tomorrow the early game, with a 1:00 (all times Eastern) kickoff is the GameAbove Sports Bowl, shown on ESPN and played in Detroit. It features the C Michigan Chippewas (7-5/84), 5th in the MAC, against the Big Ten’s Northwestern Wildcats, tied for 10th in that conference. The Chippewas won their opener before dropping two against Core 4 opponents, Pittsburgh and Michigan. Two more wins and an upset loss to Akron, then two more wins and a loss to MAC Champion W Michigan, then 2 more wins and a loss to Toledo. Nearly a perfect pattern. Their best win was against fellow MAC school Buffalo (5-7/111) while their worst loss was that upset to Akron (5-7/113). They only faced 4 bowl teams and lost to all of them. Northwestern started 1-2 with losses to playoff teams Tulane and Oregon. They bounced back with a 4-game win streak before dropping 4 of the last 5 to end the season. Their best win was versus Penn St (6-6/40) while their worst loss was to 5-7/53 Nebraska. They were 2-6 against bowl teams including the two losses to playoff teams. Vegas likes NW-10.5 and the GCR agrees with the win at 58.0%, but has CMI covering the spread.
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We leave the cold of Detroit and head to the desert of Phoenix for the Rate Bowl. Also on ESPN and airing at 4:30, the game features the New Mexico Lobos (9-3/51) who were tied for first in the Mountain West but did not make the championship game due to tiebreakers. A slow 3-3 start was followed by a perfect second half. Their best victory was against San Diego St (903/44) but their last loss was the worst of the season to San Jose St (3-9/132). A winning 3-2 mark against bowl teams did not include any playoff teams. They will meet the Big Ten’s Minnesota Golden Gophers (7-5/50) who tied for 7th in the conference. The M never got any streaks going winning 2 losing 1, winning 1, losing 1, winning 2, losing 1, winning 1, losing 2, winning 1. They had their best win against Nebraska (7-5/53) while their worst loss was to Northwestern (6-6/60). The win against Nebraska was the only one in 6 tries versus bowl teams including losing to both Ohio St and Oregon, who made the playoffs. Vegas sees a close game with MINN-1.5 and the GCR agrees but by a slightly larger margin at 54.5%. Gophers cover.
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We travel east for our nightcap, an 8:00 game aired on ESPN out of Dallas. The SERVPRO First Responder bowl features two Group of 5 teams, the FIU Panthers (7-5/78), tied for 4th in C-USA, and the UTSA Roadrunners (6-6/83), tied for 6th in the American Conference. FIU struggled to a 3-5 record before ending the season with a 4-game winning streak. UTSA never won or lost more than 2 in a row in a see-saw season. The Panthers best win was against W Kentucky (9-4/66) while their worst loss was to Missouri St (7-5/96) who were in their first season in the FBS (FIU also lost to the other newbie FBS Delaware). With a schedule featuring 7 future bowl teams, they went 2-5. The Roadrunners beat playoff team Tulane (11-3/42) as their best victory but lost to Temple (5-7/105). They were also 2-5 against bowl teams, but went 1-1 against playoff teams, losing to Texas A&M. Vegas has UTSA-4.5 as the favorite, but the algorithm in the GCR calls this the upset of the day – FIU 51.0% and to cover.
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Thank you for reading and sharing. We are planning to be back to talk about the busiest day in the bowl season as 8 games are being played on December 27th. We welcome feedback, questions, and challenges as we use all of that to make our blog better, JoJo and G.
