Rutgers bowl game eligibility: Scarlet Knights' 2023 football schedule, path to postseason

Rutgers’ Saturday football game vs. Indiana is more than just a matchup of Big Ten East division teams. For the Scarlet Knights, it’s an opportunity to do something they haven’t done in nearly a decade.

At 5-2 overall and 2-2 in the Big Ten entering the contest, Rutgers is one victory away from accruing enough wins for bowl eligibility, something it hasn’t done since 2014, back in its first season in the Big Ten.

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The Scarlet Knights played in the Gator Bowl at the end of the 2021 season, but they made the bowl with a 5-7 record. They were only selected for the game after Texas A&M had to withdraw nine days before the game. The Aggies' combination of injuries and a COVID-19 outbreak left them without enough players to safely play vs. Wake Forest. The NCAA allows 5-7 teams to compete in bowl games if there are not enough six-win teams to fill open spots, with 5-7 teams with the highest Academic Progress Rate (APR) scores getting the first chance at bowl invitations. That season, Rutgers topped that APR list.

Bowl eligibility this season would represent a breakthrough of sorts for a program that has largely struggled on the field since making the move to the Big Ten in 2014. In eight seasons, from 2015-22, Rutgers went 25-69 overall and 10-61 in conference play. Both of those marks rank as the worst in the conference in that span of time.

Scarlet Knights coach Greg Schiano, who is in the fourth season of his second stint at the school, was at the helm for six bowl berths in seven years from 2005-11, with the Scarlet Knights winning all but the 2005 Insight Bowl. Following Schiano's exit from the program after 2011, Kyle Flood led three more bowl trips from 2012-14, including a win in the 2014 Quick Lane Bowl.

This year’s version of the Scarlet Knights has gotten on the precipice of bowl eligibility through a stingy defense that is tied with Alabama for 12th among FBS teams in points allowed per game, while their offense is averaging 10.3 points per game more than it did last season.

With Rutgers on the verge of a notable accomplishment in one of college football’s toughest conferences, let’s take a look at its bowl history, as well as its remaining path to bowl eligibility:

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Rutgers bowl history

A win Saturday would give the Scarlet Knights at least six victories in a season for the 38th time in the history of a program that played in what is believed to be the first college football game in 1869.

Of those previous 37 seasons, 11 resulted in a bowl appearance. That count, however, doesn’t include some of the best seasons in Rutgers history. Since 1960, the Scarlet Knights have finished with at least eight wins on seven different occasions only to not compete in a bowl, highlighted by the 1976 season in which they went 11-0 and did not take part in a postseason game of any kind.

Here’s a list of Rutgers’ previous bowl games, with the Scarlet Knights’ record that year in parenthesis:

• 2021 (5-8): 38-10 loss vs. Wake Forest in Gator Bowl

• 2014 (8-5): 40-21 win vs. North Carolina in Quick Lane Bowl

• 2013 (6-7): 29-16 loss vs. Notre Dame in Pinstripe Bowl

• 2012 (9-4): 13-10 OT loss vs. Virginia Tech in Russell Athletic Bowl

• 2011 (9-4): 27-13 win vs. Iowa State in Pinstripe Bowl

• 2009 (9-4): 45-24 win vs. UCF in St. Petersburg Bowl

• 2008 (8-5): 29-23 win vs. NC State in PapaJohns.com Bowl

• 2007 (8-5): 52-30 win vs. Ball State in International Bowl

• 2006 (11-2): 37-10 win vs. Kansas State in Texas Bowl

• 2005 (7-5): 45-40 loss vs. Arizona State in Insight Bowl

• 1978 (9-3): 34-18 loss vs. Arizona State in Garden State Bowl

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Rutgers remaining schedule

Saturday’s game against Indiana is important not only because of what a win would provide for Rutgers, but because of what remains on the Scarlet Knights’ schedule after their trip to Bloomington.

At 2-4, the Hoosiers are the final team on Rutgers’ schedule that has a losing record. Three of the Scarlet Knights’ four remaining opponents after Saturday are ranked in the US LBM Coaches Poll, including a pair of top-10 teams in No. 3 Ohio State and No. 6 Penn State.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Rutgers bowl eligibility: Breaking down Scarlet Knights' 2023 schedule