BOWL SEASON PREVIEW: Moral Victory! rankings and predictions

Five days till the bowls start. Thought we'd go ahead and tell you who we're picking, as well as group the bowls together in case you're looking for recommendations as to which ones are actually worth watching.

As for our Music City Bowl prediction, you'll just have to wait until we get closer to New Year's Eve for that one. We want to go out on a limb and pick the Commodores, but they don't win when we pick ’em to win and they win when we don't pick ’em to win. So we're considering picking them to lose so they'll win. But for now, we'll just rate that game an "Old-Fashioned Slobber-Knocker."

Here we go:

HIGH-FLYING THRILLERS
• Poinsettia Bowl (Dec. 23): Boise State over TCU
• Hawaii Bowl (Dec. 24): Hawaii over Notre Dame
• Alamo Bowl (Dec. 29): Missouri over Northwestern
• Cotton Bowl (Jan. 2): Texas Tech over Ole Miss
• GMAC Bowl (Jan. 6): Tulsa over Ball State
• National Championship Game (Jan. 8): Florida over Oklahoma

OLD-FASHIONED SLOBBER-KNOCKERS
• Sun Bowl (Dec. 31): Oregon State over Pittsburgh
• Music City Bowl (Dec. 31): Boston College vs. Vanderbilt (PREDICTION COMING LATER)
• Outback Bowl (Jan. 1): South Carolina over Iowa
• Orange Bowl (Jan. 1): Virginia Tech over Cincinnati
• Liberty Bowl (Jan. 2): Kentucky over East Carolina

DARN INTERESTING
• Las Vegas Bowl (Dec. 20): BYU over Arizona
• Emerald Bowl (Dec. 27): California over Miami (Fla.)
• Papajohns.com Bowl (Dec. 29): NC State over Rutgers
• Holiday Bowl (Dec. 30): Oklahoma State over Oregon
• Gator Bowl (Jan. 1): Clemson over Nebraska
• Fiesta Bowl (Jan. 5): Texas over Ohio State

NOT REALLY CLOSE, BUT STILL DARN INTERESTING
• Champs Sports Bowl (Dec. 27): Florida State over Wisconsin
• Chick-fil-A Bowl (Dec. 31): Georgia Tech over LSU
• Capital One Bowl (Jan. 1): Georgia over Michigan State
• Rose Bowl (Jan. 1): USC over Penn State
• Sugar Bowl (Jan. 2): Alabama over Utah

MILDLY INTERESTING
• EagleBank Bowl (Dec. 20): Wake Forest over Navy
• St. Petersburg Bowl (Dec. 20): South Florida over Memphis
• New Orleans Bowl (Dec. 21): Troy over Southern Miss
• Meineke Car Care Bowl (Dec. 27): West Virginia over North Carolina
• Armed Forces Bowl (Dec. 31): Air Force over Houston
• Insight Bowl (Dec. 31): Kansas over Minnesota

ALL-AROUND SNOOZERS
• New Mexico Bowl (Dec. 20): Fresno State over Colorado State
• Motor City Bowl (Dec. 26): Central Michigan over Florida Atlantic
• Independence Bowl (Dec. 28): Louisiana Tech over Northern Illinois
• Humanitarian Bowl (Dec. 30): Nevada over Maryland
• Texas Bowl (Dec. 30): Rice over Western Michigan
• International Bowl (Jan. 3): Buffalo over Connecticut