The University of Minnesota's 5-7 football group simply won the Quick Lane Bowl, but how did the crew get a bowl game with such a unhealthy record?

The Gist:

• The Minnesota Golden Gophers won the Quick Lane Bowl despite a 5-7 record because of a tiebreaker that decided the workforce was once the most academically excellent 5-7 workforce in the NCAA.
• Minnesota had won six directly bowls and extended that streak to seven with a win over Bowling Green in the Quick Lane Bowl.

Usually, bowl video games in college soccer are reserved for groups that experience confirmed themselves to be very good in the future during the common season. That's why it should appear peculiar that the University of Minnesota Golden Gophers got the chance to play Bowling Green in the Quick Lane Bowl at the end of the 2023 season.

Minnesota will have prevailed throughout the bowl game, however for the reason that the workforce had simply a 5-7 record, many sports fanatics were scratching their heads about how Minnesota wound up in a bowl game to begin with. In this situation, it sort of feels like the team's record had little or no to do with it.

Why did the University of Minnesota get a bowl game?

As it seems, Minnesota won the actual quantity of games it needed to to compete in the Quick Lane Bowl. Out of all the NCAA teams that had won 5 video games this season, Minnesota had the best Academic Progress Rate, that means they had been chosen for the bowl game partly because of how just right the team's performance was once in the lecture room. Minnesota has a historical past of good fortune at this Bowl Game, and won it once more this 12 months.

"Maybe on the field we didn't have enough wins, but we talk about why these men are student-athletes, celebrating their success not only on the field but also in the classroom," Fleck instructed the Associated Press. "We're the example of that this year."

Minnesota was once the worst staff to compete in a Bowl this yr. There were eighty two groups required for this year's bowl games, and only seventy nine groups eligible to fill those slots.

As a end result, 3 colleges got the alternative regardless of having less-than-stellar resumes. Two have been filled by way of James Madison and Jacksonville State, who another way don't have been allowed to play in a bowl game as a result of they simply recently earned FCS status. The closing slot was stuffed through Minnesota because the tie-breaker involved academics as an alternative of one thing about their play on the box.

Minnesota was the only team with a shedding record to compete in a bowl game, and they extended their streak of profitable six immediately bowl games with a victory over Bowling Green, who had a successful record right through the season.

While maximum of the highest-profile college soccer video games happen at the very finish of the 12 months, Minnesota's victory is a reminder that educational excellence can also be a reward, even for athletes taking part in at a very prime degree. If the avid gamers didn't have the grades, Minnesota would never have even had the alternative to compete in this specific game.

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