Cal projected to Sun Bowl or LA Bowl by ESPN & CBS

The Bears are closing in on their second straight bowl berth

Credit: Tony The Tiger Sun Bowl

After Cal defeated Wake Forest, the Bears now have a 98% chance to make a bowl game according to their FPI. With Cal expected to be huge favorites against their rivals Stanford in the 2024 Big Game, and solid favorites against Syracuse, the odds of winning six games are overwhelmingly in their favor.

So let’s start looking at the bowl projections.

Again, because the Pac-12 bowl contracts don’t run out until 2025-26, Cal is still latched onto the existing Pac-12 bowl order. For those wondering, the bowl selection order should be the same as last year: Alamo, Holiday, Vegas, Sun, LA and Independence.

Here are the current projections from the main media outlets.

• Jerry Palm of CBS Sports has Cal playing Duke in the Tony the Tiger Sun Bowl on December 31.

• Kyle Bonagura of ESPN places Cal against Lousiville, also in the Sun Bowl.

• Mark Schlabach of ESPN puts Cal in the Gronk LA Bowl on December 18, playing UNLV.

• Brett McMurphy of Action Sports places Cal in the Armed Forces Bowl on December 27, against West Virginia.

There is one caveat for the Sun Bowl potentially picking Cal: The matchup is Pac-12 vs. ACC, which would turn this into basically a ninth conference game. I would guess the Sun Bowl might tilt away from this and pick a Big Ten or Big 12 Pac-12 legacy program in that situation, leaving the LA Bowl to pick Cal.

Looking at other bowl eligible teams.

• Oregon is projected to make the College Football Playoff as the 1 seed, and should clinch it with two of three wins in the regular season/B1G title game.

• Colorado controls their College Football Playoff destiny—winning out would give them the Big 12 title. If not, the Alamo Bowl seems likely to take them.

• Washington State is still alive for the playoff, but needs Boise State to lose once and Army to probably lose twice. With at least 10 wins likely on deck, the Cougars have eyes on either the Alamo or Holiday Bowl.

• Arizona State stands at 7-2, and likely projects to 8-4 with hapless Arizona at home and two ranked teams left. They will likely be next up, with the Vegas Bowl a good bet with the current configuration.

Teams that remain on the bubble with Cal are 4-5 USC (plays Nebraska, at UCLA, Notre Dame), 4-5 UCLA (plays at Washington, USC, Fresno State), 4-5 Utah (plays at Colorado, Iowa State, at UCF) and 5-5 Washington (plays UCLA, at Oregon).

If you are a Cal fan who wants to travel to a good bowl, you will want to start rooting for Colorado to win out and make the 12-team playoff. That would bump the Pac-12 legacy schools up one spot, and could elevate Cal into the Holiday/Vegas Bowl tier.

First things first though. The Bears need to win at least one more game (and probably two) before they can start aiming that high.