Five teams that are not BCS fans

There's something about college football's bowl system that seems guaranteed to leave a sour taste in plenty of mouths. If the BCS isn't stepping on toes, the NCAA or some bowl committee with a grudge is. And there are some angry fans in Lafayette, La., and San Jose, Calif., just to start.

After 6-6 BCS teams such as N.C. State and Notre Dame snapped up bowl berths, the six non-BCS 6-6 teams without conference bids were left scrambling for two spots: one in the Motor City Bowl and one in the Independence Bowl.

Northern Illinois, out of the MAC, got the call from the Independence Bowl, which passed on local hero Louisiana-Lafayette to take the Huskies, who will face Louisiana Tech. The Motor City Bowl picked Florida Atlantic out of the Sun Belt to face Central Michigan.

As hard as it may be to feel sorry for a 6-6 team that doesn't go to a bowl, the four teams left home make up four-fifths of Tuesday's Top Five -- with the fifth spot going to another team that has a different, but equally valid, grudge against the bowl system.

5. ARKANSAS STATE -- Two qualifying Sun Belt teams made it to bowls. Two didn't. Louisiana-Lafayette was one, Arkansas State was the other. It's hard to feel too sorry for the Red Wolves, though -- had they beaten Troy on Saturday, they would have won a share of the conference title and gone to the New Orleans Bowl.

4. SAN JOSE STATE -- The Spartans were passed over for Florida Atlantic, a school that wasn't even playing Division I football a decade ago. At least they can take consolation that with the Motor City Bowl apparently the last to choose, they were No. 69 for 68 bowl bids.

3. BOWLING GREEN -- The Falcons started the season with an upset of Pittsburgh but couldn't maintain their momentum during the MAC season. Maybe they would have been more attractive if they hadn't fired coach Gregg Brandon, who went 44-30 in six seasons at the school, 31-17 in the MAC.

2. LOUISIANA-LAFAYETTE -- The Ragin' Cajuns had sights of a local grudge match against Louisiana Tech dancing in their heads, only to be bumped from what they considered their rightful spot in Shreveport by usurpers from Northern Illinois, of all places.

Turns out, the Independence Bowl wasn't very interested -- perhaps because an NIU athletic administrator spent 11 years as the executive director of the bowl. Ouch.

1. TEXAS -- There's really no way around this, is there? Texas beat Oklahoma. It's just that simple.