The story of a bowl, as told through social media.

Mark Hudspeth bets you won’t hit a hit a hit a hit a [radio edit]

— Jason Kirk (@JasonKirkSBN) December 22, 2012

ecu: the late night wrestling on cable access you watch when you can’t sleep of football

— Martin Rickman (@martinrickman) December 22, 2012

More like New Score-leans Bowl.

— SBN College Football (@SBNationCFB) December 22, 2012

Key West. Eating juevos rancheros & watching New Orleans Bowl. Just like Hemingway used to roll. twitpic.com/boagxb

— Ryan McGee (@ESPNMcGee) December 22, 2012

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Follow this trailer to the New Orleans Bowl. (Holly Anderson/SI.com)

The 2012 New Orleans Bowl is just hours away. We’re sure you have so many questions. We’re here to help. (For an X’s and O’s breakdown, click through to Zac Ellis’ game preview.)

• What’s all this, then? The R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl is one of the stabler games in the current postseason field, running on just its second title sponsor since its first year in 2002, and one of the most attractive travel options of 2012, combining hordes of nearby Cajuns with postseason football and New Orleans nightlife.

• Where will this game be played? The Mercedes-Benz Superdome in New Orleans, home to the New Orleans Saints, Tulane football team and the Sugar Bowl.

• When is it on television? Coverage begins at Noon E.T. on ESPN with Beth Mowins, Joey Galloway and Quint Kessenich bringing you the action. The game will also be streamed on WatchESPN.

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Jordan Lynch, pinballer of the year. (AP)

Our weekly highlight show of lesser FBS luminaries. Non-AQs and independents, be welcome. WE HAVE MUCH TO DISCUSS.

• On teams about to move themselves outside our purview. Like we said this morning, we had no sooner finished updating our magnificent work of college football realignment art than word came down we might need to add Middle Tennessee State to it. And right as we were wrapping up this here column, Florida Atlantic joins the fray, chasing FIU to Conference USA. Consider this another plea for a dead period in conference realignment, for the sake of everyone’s collective multitasking abilities, at least until the bowls are over. What on earth else are we going to talk about in February if we get all this conference-hopping sorted out before Christmas?

And what to do with some of these teams going forward? We have a while to figure it out, obviously, but how to cover this ballooning middle class created by the sinking of the Big East? Will the Blue Raiders graduate from Profiterole-dom as Temple did last year? We’ll probably dedicate way more thought to this than we should; but, again, best to save that for the offseason when we have nothing better to do.

• Conference races drawing to a close. Where we’re at heading into that weird hybrid weekend of regular and postseason games: Kent State and Northern Illinois meet Friday night in Detroit for the MAC title game. Tulsa hosts Central Florida this Saturday for the C-USA championship. The Mountain West remains deadlocked in that wacky three-way tie between San Diego State, Fresno State and Boise State, with only the Broncos’ Saturday date with Nevada standing any chance of breaking it. The top two teams in the Sun Belt, Arkansas State and Middle Tennessee, play a final regular-season game Saturday that may as well be the conference title game. Utah State has clinched the WAC title outright with last week’s victory over Idaho. And Army and Navy will meet a week from Saturday for the right to hoist the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy, with Air Force out of the race entirely for the first time since 2005.

• Bowltyme! Stewart Mandel’s latest postseason projections can be found here, along with a freshly-updated chart listing every accepted bowl invitation. Profiteroles playing this holiday season include Nevada in the New Mexico Bowl, Utah State in the Potato, San Diego State and BYU in the Poinsettia, Louisiana in the New Orleans, SMU in the Hawaii, Air Force in the Armed Forces and Navy in the Fight Hunger.

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Will Kent State’s Dri Archer earn a return to his home state of Florida this postseason? (AP)

• Peasants at the gates! Utah State and San Jose State make their first appearances in the BCS rankings, while Northern Illinois enters the BCS Top 25 for the first time in 2012. Are we in for some surprise gate-crashers in the big-money bowls after all? Maybe. Allow SMQ to explain it all for you: “So even for the winner, the potential stakes in the MAC title game range from the Orange Bowl to the GoDaddy.com Bowl, with nothing in between.” And remember not to overlook this Friday’s NIU-Kent State showdown while penciling the Golden Flashes in for a trip to Florida.

• Cajuns to New Orleans to repeat legendary tailgating feats. Bowl invitations issued over the weekend: Utah State to a second consecutive Famous Idaho Potato Bowl, Nevada to the New Mexico Bowl and the Ragin’ Cajuns to their second New Orleans Bowl. Now, we didn’t see the Cajuns in their postseason appearance in person last year, but we have been to New Orleans for college football games, and been to tailgates in Lafayette, and this game just became our first mandatory trip of the postseason. Stewart Mandel’s latest bowl projections can be found here, freshly updated with all invited teams.

• Coach firin’ season, continued. Jon Embree tells the Denver Post he’d been told just last week that his job was safe … one Post columnist calls Embree’s ouster shameful and unjust … Marshall’s defensive coordinator has resigned … and Ellis Johnson’s press conference has been canceled, with a team meeting scheduled for 4:00. Nothing to see here!

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Louisiana-Lafayette fans (and mascot Cayenne) celebrated the Ragin' Cajuns New Orleans Bowl win over San Diego State in style. (Icon SMI)

• Bowltyme! Important takeaways from the first three contests of the college football bowl season: Wyoming fans are people you want to party with. Louisiana fans, even more so. Maybe give Louisiana’s S&C coach a wide berth. Illegal stemming: It’s a thing! Penn Wagers: doin’ Penn Wagers things. A Cowboys extra point attempt very nearly triggered our long-standing “hit both uprights and the crossbar and you win the game” rule. It was the play of the day, until the last play of the night. And I know you’ve found yourselves wondering: Just how are these three contests like artisanal pork products? [Recaps: Temple 37-Wyoming 15; Ohio 24-Utah State 23; Louisiana 32-San Diego State 30]

• A souvenir football on every mantel: In non-FBS goings-on: Mars Hill’s Jonas Randolph is having a pretty good week. Pittsburgh State wins its second DII title in program history. Wisconsin-Whitewater captures a third consecutive Division III national championship. And the States of Sam Houston and North Dakota will vie for the FCS title in January.

• Fresh coaches, bought and sold! Amid speculation he might leave for the Pitt job, Paul Rhoads has re-upped with Iowa State. Reportedly out of the Akron and Southern Miss coaching searches, respectively: Pat Narduzzi and Kirby Smart. And take a minute today to read about the effect outgoing Iowa defensive coordinator Norm Parker had on one former player. And Gary Crowton will do … something … at Maryland.

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The New Mexico, Famous Idaho Potato and New Orleans bowls take place on Saturday, Dec. 17.

Three bowl games of varying degrees of glory kick off the 2011 postseason. Study up!

New Mexico Bowl (Temple vs. Wyoming): 2 p.m. ET, ESPN.

Read the preview:

The first bowl of the postseason features two programs with something to prove. Last season, Al Golden’s Temple squad finished 8-4 but was the only bowl-eligible team with more than six wins not to receive a postseason invitation. First-year Temple coach Steve Addazio helped the Owls avoid another snub in 2011 with a stingy defense and run-based offense that scored at least 34 points in seven of eight victories behind the nation’s seventh-best rushing attack (257 yards per game). Meanwhile, Wyoming aims to brand the New Mexico Bowl as its own by seeking the program’s second straight victory in the Albuquerque classic.

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With more than 42,000 tickets already sold, fans of the Ragin' Cajuns will be swarming New Orleans in droves. (Icon SMI)

The 2011 R + L Carriers New Orleans Bowl is just days away. We’re sure you have so many questions. We’re here to help. (For an Xs and Os breakdown, check out Ben Glicksman’s bowl preview.)

• Where can I watch it? The Louisiana Superdome, New Orleans.

• When is it on television? Kickoff is scheduled for 9:00 p.m. ET on Saturday, December 17. The game will be televised on ESPN, and serves as the final contest of the postseason-opening tripleheader.

• Who does it feature? Conference USA and the Sun Belt are the current tie-in leagues.

• What about this year? Homefield advantage, stand up! Louisiana’s Ragin’ Cajuns (8-4) have earned their first postseason berth since 1970, and will make the two-hour trek from Lafayette, accompanied by a horde of gleefully squalling tailgaters, to face the San Diego State Aztecs (8-4).

• Who sponsors it? “Global Transportation Provider” R + L Carriers has served as title sponsor since 2006.

• Back up the pony. Is even a city so fervently devoted to exhibition and joyous mayhem prepared for the arrival of 18,000 roaring Cajuns intent on making a spectacle of themselves? They’ll have more than that. According to the Lafayette Advertiser, fans of the team are blowing through their ticket allotment, with more than 42,000 tickets distributed. We could be looking at a record-setting crowd for this bowl game. But both the city and the Ragin’ Cajuns themselves were made for this kind of party, I think. 

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