Louisville vs. Miami, 2013 Russell Athletic Bowl: Teddy Bridgewater goes out* on top

Tyler Lockett’s listed weight. The Kansas State junior receiver might be, pound for pound, the best player in college football, and if he returns for his senior season (and one assumes he will), KSU fans have only his minimal pounds to thank for it.

Lockett is in no way of typical NFL size, and his name doesn’t exactly come up in mock-Draft discussions, but he might be the strongest combination of speed and route-running in college football right now.

If the Russell Athletic Bowl proves to be Teddy Bridgewater’s final collegiate performance, then he could not have picked a finer way to go out, returning to his home state of Florida and leading the Louisville Cardinals to an easy 36-9 win.

It did not start out as a blowout, though. Indeed, when Bridgewater was tackled in the end zone by Deon Bush for a safety just five minutes into the game, it looked like the Hurricanes were ready to wreck some havoc in their return to bowl season.

This is, of course, the second time Bridgewater has created a ridiculous highlight in the last four weeks. Cincinnati still sees this throw in their nightmares.

Check out more on Bridgewater and where SB Nation sees him heading in our latest mock draft.

Kickers don’t always get to be on the field, but when they do, well... this can happen and it’s entertaining to say the least:

Kicker fight! Look at John Wallace get after it.

Bowl games involve weird things, like football players eating tons of food and Frank Beamer dancing in a sombrero. But of those things, Louisville lineman Jamon Brown singing John Legend’s “Ordinary People” at the Russell Athletic Bowl is the best thing we’ve seen.

I am male, and therefore was under the impression that it was physically impossible for me to get pregnant. However, I’m watching a 6’6, 350-pound man whose name is Spanish for ham singing the most romantic song ever, and I need an ambulance because I am about to give birth to triplets.

When Louisville and Miami take the field in Orlando for the Russell Athletic Bowl, there will be a common theme: what could’ve been in 2013.

It’s rare to get two teams in a non-BCS bowl game that were both ranked in the top 10 at one point in the season. We’ll get a chance to see it happen in Orlando.

We are all Mean Girls sometimes. Do something cool? You’re one of us! Here, let me take you around to all of the places the cool kids go. Did you see the way [Cool Kid of the Opposite Sex] was looking at you? And prom’s right around the corner! That’s so awesome for you!

The cool kid treatment is addictive. Just ask Louisville and Miami, both of whom beat Florida in a three-game span (Louisville 33, No. 4 Florida 23 in the Sugar Bowl and Miami 21, No. 12 Florida 16 on September 7). Louisville leaped from 22nd before the Sugar Bowl to ninth before the 2013 season began; Miami, meanwhile, went from unranked to 16th. Both teams got as high as seventh in the polls, and one of them (Louisville) was treated as a legitimate national title contender.

The Hurricanes (ACC, 9-3 SU, 5-7 ATS, 7-5 OU) haven’t won a bowl game since topping the Nevada Wolfpack in the MPC Computers Bowl back in 2007, going 0-3 SU and ATS in three bowl appearances since.

The Louisville Cardinals are 3-1 SU over their last four bowl games, including last year’s upset win over Florida as a 14.5-point underdog in the Sugar Bowl.

The ACC had 11 bowl-eligible teams this season, with Pitt tying for both the worst overall record (6-6, with North Carolina and Syracuse) and conference record (3-5, with Maryland) among them. The Panthers did beat three other bowl teams this season, with an early-year win over Duke and late-season victories over Notre Dame and Syracuse.

Ralph Friedgen’s final game as Maryland’s head coach came in the 2010 Military Bowl -- the game was also the Terrapins’ last bowl game. Athletic director Kevin Anderson made the change from Friedgen to Randy Edsall, saying he wanted the program to go from “good to great,” and three years later, the Terps get to go to the same place.

Dyer, who transferred to Louisville last summer, has been hampered for months by a nagging groin and hip injury. He last appeared in a game on Oct. 18 as the Cardinals took on UCF, though he only recorded one carry. He’ll end the season rushing for 223 yards and two touchdowns on just 44 carries.

Along with Senorise Perry, look for junior tailback Dominique Brown to get a good amount of the carries against Miami. The Cardinals have done a nice job running the ball all season long, though injuries have held them back at times. With Perry close to being completely healthy and Brown running as well as he has all year long, look for UL to pound the ball on the ground against a questionable front-seven for Miami.

Few bowls have experienced as much sponsorship turnover as the Russell Athletic Bowl, which has previously been been named after titans of industry such as Blockbuster, CarQuest, Champs Sports and MicronPC.com. Since 2001, the game has been played at the Citrus Bowl in Orlando. Prior to that, the game was played in SunLife Stadium, the home of the Miami Dolphins.

The Russell Athletic Bowl’s conference tie-ins are with the ACC and AAC, which probably makes their board meetings pretty confusing.