The expectation for the Oklahoma Sooners in 2026 was not only to make it back to the College Football Playoff, but to go farther there than they did last year. That would mean winning the program's first playoff game.
However, after OU's less-than-stellar start to the season, many believe they'll instead be on the outside looking in when it comes to the CFP. That includes Sports Illustrated's Bryan Fischer, who has Oklahoma missing the playoff in his latest bowl projections.
In the SEC, the teams that qualify for the CFP are off the board for the remaining bowl selections. The Citrus Bowl gets to pick the top team in the SEC that does not qualify for the playoff.
After that, there's a pool of six bowls, with no pecking order, that will consult
with the SEC and school personnel to determine where teams are scheduled. They'll try to create the best possible matchups. For 2026, those bowls (in no particular order) are the Gator Bowl, the Las Vegas Bowl, the Liberty Bowl, the Music City Bowl, the ReliaQuest Bowl, and the Texas Bowl.
After that, two more bowls, the Birmingham Bowl and the Gasparilla Bowl, will get to pick from any bowl-eligible SEC teams that do not yet have a landing spot.
Fischer has Oklahoma landing in the Las Vegas Bowl this season, and that game will be played on New Year's Eve. The SEC and the Big Ten alternate which league sends a team to the Las Vegas Bowl each season, with the SEC getting even years and the Big Ten getting odd years. The other game that follows that pattern is the Duke's Mayo Bowl.
OU's projected opponent in that game is the Washington Huskies, and they're fulfilling the legacy Pac-12 bid for the bowl, despite now playing in the Big Ten. The 10 former Pac-12 teams are still are still eligible for Pac-12-affiliated bowl games, as are the teams that are currently in the Pac-12.
Oklahoma and Washington have met three times on the gridiron. The first came in the 1985 Orange Bowl, which came at the end of the 1984 season. The Huskies won that game 28-17 on New Year's Day, denying the Sooners at least a piece of the national title. Instead, BYU won it all that season. However, Oklahoma won the national championship the following season, their third under Barry Switzer.
The other two matchups were OU wins. The Sooners won 37-20 in Norman in 2006, and dominated in a 55-14 win in Seattle in 2008.
Obviously, a trip to the Las Vegas Bowl is not what OU has in mind for this season. With the difficulty of their schedule in the SEC this year, the Sooners will have plenty more opportunities to prove to the committee that they belong in the playoff bracket, but they'll be facing an uphill battle after the way they've started this season.
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This article originally appeared on Sooners Wire: Where does Sports Illustrated have the Sooners bowling after Week 3?
