Mobile version. Acronyms are explained below. All times Eastern and PM, except where obvious. As of 01/07/2014 02:30:57 AM -0800.

Teams 6-6 or better that need at-large bids: Western Kentucky (8-4), Louisiana-Monroe (6-6), South Alabama (6-6), Troy (6-6), Texas State (6-6), Toledo (7-5), Central Michigan (6-6), Florida Atlantic (6-6), San Jose State (6-6)

Overall: 21-14 (60%)
Scores: 2-68 (2.86%)

Old predictions
Past years: 2012 | 2011 | 2010 | 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 | 2002 | 2001 | 2000 | 1999 | Index

BCS Selection Process for 2010-2014:
The order of selection for at-large bids is as follows: Orange, Sugar, Fiesta.
1. The top 2 teams go to the national title game and conference champs of the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12, and SEC go to their games.
2. The bowls that lose their automatic qualifiers get to replace them first. The bowl that would have the #1 team goes first if both teams lost their bowls. The first bowl may not take a team from the same conference as the #2 team without permission. In addition, the first year the Rose Bowl loses a team to the championship game and a non-BCS conference team qualifies, that team must go to the Rose.
3. The remaining bowls pick automatic qualifiers in this order: Fiesta, Sugar, and then Orange.
4. After the selections are made, the conferences (and Notre Dame) can adjust the pairings to take the following factors into account:
a) Whether the same team will be playing in the same bowl for two straight years
b) Whether the two teams played against each other in the regular season
c) Whether the two teams played each other in a bowl game last year
d) "Whether alternative pairings may have greater or lesser appeal to college football fans as measured by expected ticket sales for the bowls and by expected television interest, and the consequent financial impact on ESPN and the bowls."
The pairings cannot result in a situation that removes the Big Ten or Pac-12 champion from the Rose Bowl.

What is an automatic qualifier? Well, here are the criteria (in order):
1. You finish in the top two of the standings.
2. You are the champion of the ACC, Big East AAC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12, or Southeastern Conference.
3. You are a the champion of C-USA, the MAC, the Mountain West, or the Sun Belt, and you:
a) Are ranked in the top 12
b) Or are in the top 16 and ranked above a team that qualifies under rule 2.
No more than one team meeting these provisions may get an auto-berth and the highest ranked team gets it.
4. Notre Dame will qualify if they are ranked 8th or higher.
5. If the 3rd ranked team has not earned an automatic berth by this point and there are less than 10 qualifiers, then that team gets it as long as no team in its conference is in the national title game. This team must be from an auto-qualifier conference.
6. If the 4th ranked team has not earned a berth by this point and there are less than 10 qualifiers, then that team gets it as long as no team in its conference is in the national title game. This team must be from an auto-qualifier conference.

If there are fewer than 10 automatic qualifiers, then any team in the top 14 with at least 9 wins can be picked as an at-large team. No more than two teams from any conference can be selected. If no team in the top 14 qualifies, then the pool expands to the top 18 teams, and so on in blocks of 4 teams.
Source: http://www.bcsfootball.org/news/story?id=4819597

Overall eligibility: The 2013-2014 NCAA Division I Manual (warning, PDF) bylaw 18.7.2 governs Division I-A football eligibility. The NCAA defines a "deserving team" as a team with an equal number of wins and losses, i.e, a record of 6-6 and better against FBS opponents. For the purposes of this record, a team is also allowed to count one FCS win as well. Note that it is no longer a requirement that all above .500 teams are selected before 6-6 teams. For 2013, the NCAA added what one might call the "UCLA and Georgia Tech" rule which basically boils down to: a) winning your conference title game makes you a "deserving team" and b) losing your title game does not affect your "deserving team" status.

In addition to deserving teams, bylaw 18.7.2 also spells out what will happen if there are not enough bowl eligible teams for the 35 bowl games. Note that these criteria apply in order, and a particular bowl game may use a team from this "pool" once every four years (effective 8/2012).
1. The "counting 1 FCS win" rule only applies if the FCS team in question uses 90% of available scholarships out of 63 (so 56.7 scholarships, as FCS allows partial scholarships), so the first criteria is that any FCS school counts for the 1-win.
2. Teams that finished 6-6 with two FCS wins.
3. Teams that finished 6-7 (this used to be the "UCLA rule" but conference championships can no longer make a team ineligible for a bowl).
5. Teams that are reclassifying to FBS and have a 6-6 record (so this year, Georgia State).
6. Teams in the top 5 of the APR and with a 5-7 record. This year, those teams are Northwestern, Boise State, Duke, Wisconsin, and Clemson.
These provisions are in effect for the 2012 through 2015 seasons.

It really does appear that Notre Dame does not have any non-BCS bowl tie-ins this year. They're still eligible as an at-large, obviously.
The ACC bowl selection criteria are buried in the massive media guide (warning: huge PDF) on page 15. Bowls select in the order given, and can take the team with the best available record or a team with one less conference win, with the exception of the Chick-fil-a Bowl, which can take a different team if it is ranked at least 5 spots higher in the final BCS standings.
The Big Ten bowl selection order is buried in their massive media guide on page 42.
The Pac-12 bowl selection order, on page 133.
The SEC bowl selection order.
The American bowl selection order, on page 13.
The Mountain West media guide has their selection order on page 16 (32 in their big media guide).
The MAC media guide lists its bowl tie-ins on page 11.
The Big 12 selection order.
The Sun Belt media guide this year only lists their two actual tie-ins and doesn't mention any of their backup bids, but we're assuming they're still in effect.
The C-USA media guide lists their bowls and criteria, such as they are, on page 150.

1: Sun Belt to the rescue! For 2010-2013, the Sun Belt will be the first source of back up teams for the following bowls: St. Petersburg, BBVA Compass, and the Little Casear's Bowl.
2: Primary backup for either conference is the 7th pick from Conference USA.
4: The AAC inherited the Big East's wacky agreement with the Liberty, Compass, and Beef 'O' Brady's Bowls wherein they will send a team to 2 of the 3. In years past, it seems like this only happened if there weren't enough SEC teams to go to both Birmingham and Memphis. I will continue to try to figure out more information on this situation.
5: The Russell Athletic (formerly Champs Sports) Bowl can only take Notre Dame once during the current 4-year agreement (2010-2013). They used this option in 2011 so they cannot select them again in 2012 or 2013.
6: For 2013, the MAC has agreements to provide backup for the New Mexico Bowl, Compass Bowl, Beef 'O' Brady's Bowl, and the Poinsettia Bowl.

?=at-large because some conference couldn't fill its bids
* = Accepted invitation
** = Predicted correctly
^ = It's still the Peach Bowl to me, but I finally felt I should change it
A team in bold indicates that I predicted the winner correctly
A team in italics means that team won the game, but was not who I picked
A bold score means that I actually managed to pick the score correctly|
A team that is underlined is the predicted winner

Schedule sources: CollegeFootballPoll, Matt Sarz, conference media guides (see above), and individual bowl websites.