Where Coastal Carolina is headed for a bowl, and did it get into a New Year’s Six game?
Coastal Carolina’s inability to play Saturday’s scheduled Sun Belt Conference Championship Game may have kept it out of a lucrative New Year’s Six Bowl.
The Chanticleers (11-0) were not selected to play in a New Year’s Six bowl game – the six most prestigious bowl games of the season – despite being undefeated and ranked No. 12 in the final College Football Playoff rankings.
Coastal was forced to cancel the Sun Belt Championship game Thursday against No. 19 Louisiana (9-1) because three coronavirus cases within its program and required quarantining of other players left the Chants without an entire position group, according to head coach Jamey Chadwell.
A win would have bolstered the Chants’ resume and given them a better chance to get into a NY6 game, which would have included a $6.42 million payout for the Chants and Sun Belt Conference.
The Chants are instead headed to the sixth annual FBC Mortgage Cure Bowl on Saturday in Orlando, Florida, and will face AP No. 23 Liberty (9-1), with a noon kickoff at Camping World Stadium. The Cure Bowl is a Sun Belt-contracted game that in 2018 paid out a total of $751,000 to its participating teams combined, according to collegefootballpoll.com.
“We were obviously really close to a New Year’s Six and we listened to the commissioner and the committee and they made their choice based off what they thought was right,” Chadwell said. “It doesn’t mean we have to agree with it, but at the end of the day we’re not going to let that diminish what we’ve accomplished this year and the season we’ve had.”
CCU was scheduled to face Liberty, its old rival from the Big South Conference, on Dec. 5 but the game was canceled as a result of COVID-19 cases within the Flames program. CCU instead played BYU, which was ranked No. 8 in the AP Top 25 Poll at the time, and won 22-17 for the program’s first-ever win over a top-10 FBS opponent.
Coastal and Liberty have played 14 times, with each team claiming seven wins. It is Coastal’s first ever bowl game in its third year of FBS eligibility, while Liberty is the Cure Bowl’s defending champion.
“Obviously that game was meant to be,” Chadwell said. “It’s going to be worked out. It was a huge rivalry for us back in the day. I know our fans will be excited about obviously our first bowl trip but also our opponent.”
The NY6 games include the semifinals and four other bowls being played between Dec. 30 and Jan. 2. The semifinals include No. 1 Alabama against No. 4 Notre Dame in the Rose Bowl, and No. 2 Clemson against No. 3 Ohio State in the Sugar Bowl.
No. 6 Oklahoma (8-2) and No. 7 Florida (8-3) were selected to play in the Cotton Bowl in Texas, No. 8 Cincinnati ( 9-0) and No. 9 Georgia (7-2) were selected to play in the Peach Bowl in Atlanta, and No. 25 Oregon was chosen to face No. 10 Iowa State (8-3) in the Fiesta Bowl.
The Orange Bowl matchup is No. 5 Texas A&M (8-1) against No. 13 North Carolina (8-3). The Chants were not considered for that game because the bowl is contracted with the ACC, SEC and Big Ten to supply teams.
Cincinnati was chosen for the guaranteed spot available to the highest ranked conference champion among the Group of Five conferences after the Bearcats defeated No. 24 Tulsa 27-24 in the American Athletic Conference championship game Saturday on a last-second field goal. A win by Tulsa would have likely allowed the Chants to play in the Peach Bowl.
Cincinnati entered the weekend ranked ninth in the CFP rankings and CCU was 12th and remained there after not playing.
Coastal’s argument for a NY6 selection included a pair of top-20 wins over No. 16 BYU and No. 19 Louisiana, a win over a Power Five team in Kansas of the Big 12, and another quality win over Appalachian State (9-3), which was ranked in the AP Top 25 Poll earlier in the year and still received a vote in the poll last week.
Gary Barta, CFP Selection Committee chairman and Iowa athletic director, said the committee simply believed Cincinnati was a better team than CCU, though the Bearcats’ only top 25 win came Saturday and they played two fewer games than CCU.
“The committee just believed that Cincinnati was a better team,” Barta said. “Coastal Carolina was also undefeated with two wins against ranked teams, but the full strength of schedule and watching the games really came into play here as well. . . . Statistics matter, but which one is a better team, and the committee felt strongly that Cincinnati was the better team between those two.”
Chadwell called the committee’s decision to choose Cincinnati “disheartening.”
“Resume-wise that’s why we were in the discussion, our resume was better,” Chadwell said. “What it told me was we could have played the Green Bay Packers yesterday and it wasn’t going to matter, they thought Cincinnati was a better team than us. So the only shot we had of us going would have been them losing. So that’s disheartening because you would have hoped what you put on the field would have been good enough.
“I believe we did everything possible to play in [a NY6] game and we did that on the field, playing a tougher schedule, more top 25 wins, more top 50 wins, all of those things. But they didn’t agree.”
Power Five conference champions have automatic berths in the NY6 games, so the at-large teams selected over CCU were Florida, Georgia and Iowa State, which have a combined eight losses. One of Iowa State’s losses was 31-14 against Louisiana, which CCU beat for the Ragin’ Cajuns’ only loss this season.
“I think the Iowa State one is the one that’s a little bit more disappointing,” Chadwell said. “They didn’t win their conference, they had three losses including one to a really fantastic team in Louisiana, who dominated them at their place, and obviously we beat Louisiana at their place. I think that’s the one that you sort of scratch your head on a little bit because they did have three losses and two top-25 wins. Well so did we, and we didn’t have three losses, and you lost to somebody we played. But they were in love with Iowa State the whole year long . . . They’re not going to let a Cincinnati and Coastal get all that money, I’m sure.”
Chadwell said the Chants could regain the players and coaches currently in quarantine by Wednesday if there are no further positive tests within the program. Those players will be tested Monday, Chadwell said.
Coastal finishes the regular season ranked ninth in the Associated Press Top 25 Poll and 11th in the USA Today Amway Coaches Poll after moving up a spot by passing No. 12 Iowa State, which it is ranked ahead of in both the AP and coaches polls.
Coastal is on a 12-game winning streak dating back to last season, which is tied with No. 1 Alabama for the longest current winning streak in the nation. It has recorded the first undefeated regular season in both program and Sun Belt Conference history, and is a conference co-champion with Louisiana.
“This is a historic day for us,” Chadwell said. “Obviously we made this move in 2016 for opportunities like this, to be able to compete in bowl games. This is the first one we’ve had the opportunity to be selected for. . . . That was one of our goals this season that we thought was realistic.”
This story was originally published December 20, 2020 at 3:31 PM.
