From USA Today: College football's expansive bowl lineup will grow next season — by three games and possibly four, including the first staged outside the USA in 70 years. The NCAA's Postseason Football Licensing Subcommittee, meeting Thursday in Orlando, hiked the overall number of bowls from 28 to at least 31 in approving: • The International Bowl in Toronto, the first on foreign soil since Auburn and Villanova played to a 7-7 tie in the Bacardi Bowl in Havana in 1937. • The New Mexico Bowl in Albuquerque and Birmingham (Ala.) Bowl, both operated by ESPN. • The top-tier Bowl Championship Series' expansion to a fifth game, a national title matchup played a week after the Orange, Sugar, Fiesta and Rose. Still awaiting a verdict in June is the Houston Bowl, which has lagged in paying the Big 12 and Mountain West for Iowa State's and TCU's appearances in 2005. Concerns about filling 62 or 64 bowl slots were eased earlier Thursday. With schools now allowed 12 regular-season games, the NCAA's Division I board of directors cleared 6-6 teams to play in the postseason. Unbelievable.
