Ten years ago, even as the unfortunate reign of the Bowl Championship Series raged on, the rest of college football’s imperfect postseason model seemed to have found a suitable line of demarcation.
The 2005 bowl season consisted of 28 bowls – a number that had held for four consecutive postseasons. Of the 119 college football teams available, 56 (or 47 percent of FBS member schools) were invited to a bowl. Of those 56, only five were at the minimum eligibility requirement of a 6-6 record. And none of those five was matched up against another .500 team in their respective bowls.