Over the last few years, we have seen four FBS teams with 5-7 records earn bowl game bids thanks to the ever expanding Bowl Schedule (whether or not we need that many bowl games is a discussion for another time). Though our sample size is limited, those four teams have gone 3-1 in their respective bowl games.
Typically, when there aren’t enough 6+ win teams for all the bowl games available, the remaining slots are given to 5-7 teams based on their two-year Academic Progress Rate (APR) score. Currently, Purdue’s APR is 971, which *should* put Purdue towards the higher end of the 5-7 teams, but it might not be good enough.