With the Florida State Seminoles losing for the seventh time this season, which college football team has the longest active bowl streak?
Stability is always key to success in college football. Even in down years, good to great programs always find a way into the holiday bowl season. At many Power 5 institutions, there is a good chance that they have an impressive active bowl streak intact.
However, sometimes teams have a year from hell. One program that seems to have hit rock bottom in 2018 are the Florida State Seminoles. This comes as a bit of a shock, as Florida State has been a staple of football excellence since joining the ACC in the 1990s.
Entering 2018, Florida State was rocking a 36-year bowl streak. That was snapped on Saturday afternoon, as the Seminoles fell to the in-state rival Florida Gators at home.
With Florida State taking an “l” for the seventh time this season, we can say sayonara to the Seminoles holiday season dreams. With that in mind, which team now has the longest active bowl streak in college football?
That would be the Virginia Tech Hokies. Virginia Tech beat the in-state rival Virginia Cavaliers in the Commonwealth Cup for the 15th time in a row, a thrilling victory to give the Hokies have one last shot at getting to 6-6.
They will host the Marshall Thundering Herd next Saturday in Blacksburg. Marshall is 8-3 on the year and doing well for itself in Conference USA. Virginia Tech is rocking a 26-year active bowl streak that now hangs in the balances.
So what happens if the Hokies stumble to what might very well be a better Thundering Herd team than them a week from now? Who would then have the longest after bowl streak.
That would be the Georgia Bulldogs of the SEC. Georgia is a top-five team in the nation this year, coming off a blowout win at home of the in-state rival Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets to improve to 11-1 heading into a date with the Alabama Crimson Tide in the 2018 SEC Championship next week in Atlanta.
Though Georgia has not won a national title since 1980, the Dawgs have made it to a bowl game every year since 1997. That gives the Dawgs a 21-year streak. Georgia made it to a bowl in the final four years of the Jim Donnan era in Athens (1996-00), all 15 seasons of the Mark Richt era (2001-15) and now the first three of the Kirby Smart era (2016-present) in the Classic City.
With the way Smart has his alma mater humming, it looks like the Dawgs will be on top in the active bowl streak department for the foreseeable future. Another team that is hot on Georgia’s heels would be the Oklahoma Sooners, who have made a bowl every year since 1999. That gives the Sooners a 19-year streak.
It’s only natural that traditional powers like Georgia and Oklahoma would be at the top of this active bowls streak list. However, it is strange to not have Florida State or quite possibly Virginia Tech playing in December this season. Those two programs are a mess and have a way to go to getting back to the college football postseason. Virginia Tech is still alive, but Florida State is not in 2018.