Syracuse And Kansas State Destined To Dance The Dance

Even before the bowl predictions started coming out, I had a feeling we'd end up playing Kansas State. I mean, it's practically written into law that Syracuse and Kansas State play each other every couple years in bowl games. The Wildcats have somehow become the measuring stick by which we place ourselves in the college football hierarchy.

In fact, according to the schedule, we're overdue to play them. Just look at our last five bowl games...

Following the 1997 season, Syracuse and Kansas State play in the Fiesta Bowl. Kansas State puts a 35-18 beatdown on the over-matched Orangemen, reminding us that while we made it to the next level, we still had a bit to go.

Following the '98 season we play Florida in the Orange Bowl and follow that up in '99 with a Music City Bowl against Kentucky. Then...back to normal.

In 2001, the Wildcats and Orangemen tangled again, this time in the Insight.com Bowl. Led by James Mungro, SU dominated this game and dropped the Cats 26-3.

SU returned to a bowl in 2004 against Georgia Tech and then...that's been it. According to the schedule, we were due to play Kansas State in a bowl game in 2005. Add that to the list of things Greg Robinson ruined.

But now, in 2010, we're finally ready. And it looks like we're going to get that Best-Two-Out-Of-Three match-up we've been looking for.

Ask the expert and they will tell you that Syracuse will play Kansas State in the Pinstripes Bowl. SI's Stewart Mandel says it, ESPN's Mark Schlabach and Andrea Adelson both say it, Scout.com says it, Rivals says it and NBC Sports says it.

It's a win-win-win situation, really. The Pinstripe Bowl gets great attendance from all the Syracuse fans, Doug Marrone gets to go home to the Bronx for just one of the multitude of storylines the Orange bring with them and sportswriters will have a field day with the fact that Kansas State is in Manhattan, Kansas while they're playing a bowl game right next to Manhattan, NY.

We won't know for sure until this weekend, but, I think you can pretty much assume the Football Gods are all over this one.