FanHouse PapaJohns.comBowl

FanHouse gathers around the TV to bring you insights from Bowl Season '08.

Russell Wilson got hurt. With all due respect to Rutgers players, coaches, fans and awesome Pulitzer Prize winning alumni, that's about all you need to re: the PapaJohns.com Bowl. Of course, it's also all you need to know about North Carolina State's season -- when Wilson was healthy and in the game, the Wolfpack were one of the most exciting teams in the NCAA, and when he wasn't, well, they were the type of team that could give up a first half lead to a suddenly struggling Rutgers team.

Again though: Rutgers = not bad. They came in having won six straight games, but, caveats aside, you couldn't tell by the time the clock struck zeroes on the first half. The Wolfpacka dominated, Mike Teel struggled mightily, and it looked like a runaway win for State. Then Wilson got hurt.

Turkey Legs to Go is FanHouse's complete travel guide for all of the 2008-2009 college bowl games. Here, we cover the PapaJohns.com Bowl (Birmingham, Alabama), which pits North Carolina State against Rutgers.

Overview / Matchup: Birmingham got lucky in their bowl draw this year, as both Rutgers and N.C. State come into the postseason on quite the tear. The Wolfpack features All-Universe freshman quarterback Russell Wilson, the first frosh to ever land first team All-Conference in the ACC. Meanwhile, a Cincinnati BCS berth and a six game winning streak to close out the season (highlighted by Mike Teel tossing a redonk seven touchdowns in the season finale against Louisville) lets the Scarlet Knights squeeze into a decent bowl.

Hotels: For luxury accommodation and entertainment, well-heeled travelers should stay at The Wynfrey Hotel. It's a 15-minute drive from town, but the trek is worth it if you want to do any shopping. The hotel is attached to the massive Riverchase Galleria. For good-quality accommodation closer to the stadium, try the Sheraton Birmingham Hotel. The hotel offers the best overall value for bowl travelers, combining reasonable rates with comfortable beds and a great location. For budget-minded travelers, try the Days Inn just across the highway from the stadium. They offer rooms for less than US$100 per night and the proximity can't be beat.

Restaurants/Nightlife: For fine dining in Birmingham, try Bottega Italian Restaurant. Bottega consistently receives great reviews and if the prices prove too steep, the sister restaurant, Bottega Café, next door is a more affordable alternative. Dreamland Bar-B-Que is a cheap, family-friendly alternative to high-end Italian. Dreamland is a local favorite featuring an on-site smoker and arguably the best ribs in Birmingham.

Ready for bowl season? Join FanHouse as we preview each of the 34 bowls with a lot of analysis, a little irreverence, and, we promise, at least one joke about Karl Malden's nose. Your parents, or Joe Paterno, will explain it to you.

Below are the Week 1 bowl games. Click here for Week 2 and the non-BCS bowls of Week 3. Or click here for BCS bowls analysis.

As the radio and TV keep telling us, it's the most wonderful time of the year. For college football fans, this is most certainly true. We're only 10 days away from the start of the bowl season, and already, the BCS national championship has been analyzed to death. (Hey, did you realize Oklahoma scores a lot of points? Wow, Florida has a good quarterback. I think his name is Tom Turbo or something.)

Some games get substantially less attention than the big time, big money blockbusters, however, and there's a good reason for that. They're only meaningful to the teams involved and their fans. But that doesn't mean that we fans should pay them no attention. It just means we don't need to pay them much attention.

So we at FanHouse have decided to give you a brief summary of these lesser games. I know that calling the Motor City Bowl "lesser" might be controversial, at least to people from Detroit, or people from the planet Gazorpnitz. For the rest of us, we'll keep it short. We start with the games played before Dec. 30, and if you don't see a game previewed here, it'll get more attention from one of us later. Now, onward!