Every year I look forward to the chance that I have to watch football day after day and, in particular, to see teams compete against each other that might otherwise never meet on the field had they not made it to a bowl. And this year has, once again, delivered some highly engaging football. Often, when the schedule is released too many people look at the obviously imbalanced or even the lesser-known face-offs and deem the games predictable or uninteresting, and ultimately, not worth the time and effort it takes to watch them. I will be honest in saying that I have been guilty of the same practice on occasion.

But this bowl season has changed that. With many games being decided in the last seconds of regulation play, it has been an exciting time to watch. I have noticed myself moving through channels and searching out bowl games with lower ranked teams and, surprisingly, really gaining interest in the games. Then I had the chance on New Year’s Day to watch the Iowa State Cyclones and the Minnesota Golden Gophers duke it out in the Insight.com bowl. Coming into the match-up, both teams had earned six wins on the season.  And, truthfully, they were rather exciting to watch. The teams had great talent and made significant plays on both sides of the ball.  Although both the Cyclones and the Gophers are two teams that I otherwise would not follow, I found myself resoundingly cheering and enjoying a highly entertaining match-up.

Frankly, thus far, I have been quite unimpressed with the big BCS matches. These games have been one-sided and pretty droll to watch. I turned the channel after the first half of the Sugar Bowl.

I maintain that if more people were to watch these small bowl games, they might have a better appreciation for post season bowls. I know that next year I will be looking out for more of these bowls as they are unadulterated evidence of  the true spirit of college football.