I can remember back in the day that making one of the Big Four Bowls was a sign you'd had a very good year - Cotton, Orange, Sugar, Rose. Your team was 10-1 or 11-0. Your team now played a very good to elite member of another conference (usually). I always figured "we" would blow them out because we were 10-1 and that one was a fluke loss.
The Gator Bowl was a kind of consolation prize, but still a decent bowl, and everything else meant you had a mediocre season at best, Independence, Tangerine, Peach, whatever. Your team made a bowl game but not because they were particularly good, usually, except that Nebraska team that fell to the Sun Bowl and blasted the Dawgs into smithereens.
That could happen, a national contender team could fall way way down just because .... some late loss usually. The Huskers were not happy about it. I forget who knocked them down ...
1969?
I am getting old. I am thankful I still feel pretty good. I can tell you younger folks that staying in decent shape when you are 48 is a worthy cause. Do something for yourself, it gets much harder 20 years later. And that Shingrix vaccine knocked me back for two days.
