College football predictions: Bowl Week II

Time for more college football predictions, this time the 16 games played between Christmas and New Year’s.

Insight Bowl: Oklahoma vs. Iowa, 9 p.m. Friday. Sooners 37-14. Not a good matchup for the Hawkeyes, no matter how listless the Sooners were down the stretch.

Independence Bowl: Missouri vs. North Carolina, 4 p.m. Monday. Tigers 38-28. Matchup of the school the SEC wanted (Carolina) vs. the school that it settled for (Mizzou).

Little Caesars Pizza Bowl: Purdue vs. Western Michigan, 3:30 p.m. Tuesday. Boilermakers 45-24. Risky pick. Purdue 2-2 in its last four games against the Mid-American Conference.

Belk Bowl: North Carolina State vs. Louisville, 7 p.m. Tuesday: Wolfpack 47-17. Heck of a matchup, if you’re talking about the 1983 Final Four. This game is in Charlotte, N.C., and was known as the Meineke Car Care Bowl. But the Meineke Car Care sponsorship has moved to Houston and the Texas Bowl, which once was known as the Houston Bowl. Personally, I miss the Bluebonnet Bowl.

Military Bowl: Air Force vs. Toledo, 3:30 p.m. Wednesday. Falcons 45-38. Strange pairing. The Academy is playing the Rockets.

Holiday Bowl: Texas vs. California, 7 p.m. Wednesday. Golden Bears 24-20. I don’t know if he gets enough credit, but Jeff Tedford has done a nice job with Cal football. I remember when the Bears were mostly irrelevant. I know they’re not knocking down the Rose Bowl’s door, but now they’re mostly competitive.

Champs Sports Bowl: Notre Dame vs. Florida State, 4:30 p.m. Thursday. Seminoles 26-6. The Florida State season looked so promising when they tied OU 13-13 in the fourth quarter on Sept. 17.

Alamo Bowl: Baylor vs. Washington, 8 p.m. Thursday. Bears 61-34. It would have been a nice year for OU to finally make its Alamo Bowl debut. New place to go for the fans, who need a reason to get motivated for this bowl season, and San Antonio might have been the ticket. But you can’t blame the Alamo folks for going with the Heisman Trophy winner.

Armed Forces Bowl: Tulsa vs. Brigham Young, 11 a.m. Friday. Golden Hurricane 26-24. I covered the 1996 TU-BYU game. Cougars won 55-30, and the game ended after midnight. In fact, here are the scores of the last six Tulsa-BYU games — 38-15, 45-35, 55-30, 49-39, 49-24 and 55-47. Tulsa won only the last one, in 2007.

Pinstripe Bowl: Iowa State vs. Rutgers, 2:30 p.m. Friday. Scarlet Knights 17-14. I’ll be pulling hard for the Cyclones. But Yankee Stadium is bad karma for the Big 12. Just look at the 2010 Pinstripe Bowl.

Music City Bowl: Wake Forest vs. Mississippi State, 5:40 p.m. Friday. Demon Deacons 28-21. National upset special. Game 3 of an ESPN quadrupleheader. College football fans will be worn out by the time the Insight kicks off. Also, set your DVRs, if you’re so inclined. OU-Iowa could kick off on an ESPN sister station — ESPNU or ESPN classic or ESPNNEWS — if the Music City runs long.