BYU’s Bowl Tie-In Becomes Big 12 Bowl for 2023 Season: Report
BYU has provided the Big 12 an unexpected benefit in joining the conference this season — a seventh guaranteed bowl game.
Action Network’s Brett McMurphy reported on Saturday that the Independence Bowl will join the Big 12 lineup for the 2023 season.
Why?
As an independent, BYU lined up potential bowl game tie-ins on its own. Well, the Cougars’ 2023 tie-in — assuming it had the wins to earn a bid — was the Independence Bowl in Shreveport, La.
Now, the Independence Bowl take a Big 12 team and a Pac-12 team for this year’s game.
With BYU, UCF, Cincinnati and Houston joining the league on July 1, the Big 12 could use more guaranteed bowl bids. With 14 teams, there’s a good chance that at least half of the conference will be bowl eligible.
The Big 12 has a guaranteed tie-in with one of the New Year’s Six bowl games. Usually, the Big 12 sends its champion to the Sugar Bowl — if it’s not selected for the College Football Playoff.
Since the Sugar Bowl is a CFP semifinal, the top Big 12 team will get an at-large bowl bid to one of three bowls —Cotton, Peach or Fiesta.
After that, the league has tie-ins with the Liberty Bowl, the Cheez-It Bowl, the Guaranteed Rate Bowl, the Texas Bowl and the Alamo Bowl.
The Big 12 also has opportunities to send teams to the First Responder Bowl and the Armed Forces Bowl, both of which are played in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.
You can find Matthew Postins on Twitter @PostinsPostcard
