Alamo Bowl keeps an eye on the Big 12’s best as selection approaches

With No. 15 Arizona State, No. 16 Iowa State, No. 18 BYU and No. 23 Colorado in a four-way tie at the top of the Big 12 standings, the Valero Alamo Bowl will provide one final opportunity for two of them to agree on the score.

Heading into Saturday’s conference championship games, the Alamo Bowl had four current Big 12 opponents in its sights as its most likely participants – an unusual circumstance caused by the recent wave of realignment.

With Arizona State moving into the expanded 12-team College Football Playoff after beating Iowa State 45-19 for the Big 12 title, Colorado will likely face either BYU or Iowa State in the Alamo Bowl. The matchup is scheduled to conclude on Sunday afternoon.

“There are a lot of good matchups to watch,” Alamo Bowl President Derrick Fox said. “The good news is that they are all teams that have done very well, have generally performed strongly here and seem to be very committed and excited about the opportunity to come to San Antonio.”

For 14 years, the Alamo Bowl brought together the top teams from the Big 12 and Pac-12 conferences after the New Year’s Six. Although realignment this season resulted in the dissolution of the Pac-12, the Alamo Bowl selection pool remained largely unchanged for 2024 and 2025.

One half of the game will be a team from the Big 12’s pool of eight long-time members and four newcomers to the league in 2023, with Texas and Oklahoma notably absent after moving to the SEC. On the opposite sideline will be a school from the now-defunct Pac-12 pool — four in the Big Ten, four in the Big 12, two in the ACC and two remaining in the Pac-12.

With No. 1 Oregon heading into the College Football Playoff, the top four teams eligible for the Alamo Bowl were all members of the Big 12. Iowa State and BYU represent the Big 12 pool, while Arizona State and Colorado were the best options from the Pac-12 pool.

Fox noted that all four of Saturday’s Power Conference championship games featured a team that played in a different league in 2023. The top picks in the Alamo Bowl may come from the same conference, but the potential for new combinations remains.

“Yes, it will be all four teams in the Big 12, but most of them haven’t played each other,” Fox said. “These are all new conferences and new encounters, so from that perspective there is something new.”

Arizona State’s win in the Big 12 title game left Colorado the clear first choice from the former Pac-12 pool, with BYU and championship game loser Iowa State in the running for the Big 12 spot.

Big 12 teams played nine conference games this year in its first season as a 16-team league, and potential Alamo Bowl participants crossed paths only once, when Arizona State beat BYU 28-23 just two weeks ago.

Colorado last faced Iowa State in 2010 and hasn’t played BYU since 1988, but the Buffaloes are scheduled to host both opponents next season.

Had Arizona State still been available for selection, Fox said a possible rematch of a conference game in the Alamo Bowl would be “not prohibitive.”

“Traditionally you don’t do that, but in this case it’s one matchup, one regular-season game,” Fox said. “Certainly you want to do those conversions with the respective schools to see where they stand, if that’s being considered.”

Arizona State and BYU have never played in the Alamo Bowl, while Iowa State last appeared in the game in 2018.

Colorado visited the Alamo Bowl in 2002, 2016 and 2020, but not since the arrival of coach Deion Sanders and Heisman Trophy candidates Travis Hunter and Shedeur Sanders.

While it’s always possible that players could enter the transfer portal or opt out of a bowl game leading up to the NFL Draft, Fox said the Alamo Bowl is moving “full steam ahead with teams as we know them” in the selection process.

After Colorado closed the regular season with a 52-0 win over Oklahoma State last week, Deion Sanders told the media in his postgame press conference that Hunter and Shedeur Sanders are both expected to be eligible for a bowl date.

“Our kids are going to be in our bowl game because we signed up for it, and we’re going to finish it,” Deion Sanders said. “We won’t drop out because it messes up the structure of next season. … We plan to go out there and fight like we fought today, no matter where we are.”