Sun Belt Conference Likely to Get New Bowl Tie-in in 2008 Season

The Sun Belt Conference, which has eight football members competing in the Division 1 Football Bowl Subdivision of the NCAA, will likely add another bowl game tie-in in 2008, conference commissioner Wright Waters said in a video posted to the conference website recently.

The Sun Belt has the fewest bowl tie-in contracts of the 11 FBS conferences - just one, the New Orleans Bowl. In the New Orleans Bowl, the Sun Belt champion is paired with a mutually agreed upon representative from Conference USA.

Just having one tie-in hasn't kept the SBC from placing multiple teams in bowls. In two of the last three years, a Sun Belt team was selected to go to a bowl other than the New Orleans Bowl (in 2004, Troy went to the Silicon Valley Classic in San Jose, Calif., while North Texas was in the New Orleans Bowl, and in 2006, Middle Tennessee State went to the Motor City Bowl in Detroit while Troy was in the New Orleans Bowl).

In each of the past three years, at least one bowl-eligible SBC team has been left sitting at home, and that's what Waters is hoping to change by adding a second bowl tie-in

"We're working on securing a guaranteed second bowl bid, and looking at the options out there," Waters said in the video. "We're pleased with it and we think we'll probably have something in place by the 2008 season."

The Sun Belt is the youngest league in the FBS - the conference just added football seven years ago.

Of the 11 FBS conferences, the Mid-American Conference is second in the least number of bowls behind the Sun Belt with just three tie-ins. Three conferences, the SEC, ACC, and Big XII conferences, have 8 tie-ins each.

But those three conferences, which send two-thirds of their membership to bowls during average years, have 12 members - the Sun Belt just has eight, but will be expanding to nine soon with the addition of Western Kentucky University.

Many fans of college football argue that there are already too many bowl games for the 119 FBS teams - a total of 32 games in 2006. But the addition of the BCS Championship Game in mid-January has added an empty week to the bowl schedule - plenty of time to get in a few more bowl games.

America will watch however much football you put in front of them. Plus, how can you argue that having more young adults participate in championship events is a bad thing?