Mountain West 2015 bowl projections

College football bowl invitations won't be announced until Sunday, and in the lead-up, the Mountain West's postseason picture is a muddy one.

Because of BYU's agreement with the Las Vegas and Hawaii bowls, the Cougars will take one of the Mountain West's spots in either game, meaning the conference champion might not play in Sin City against a Pac-12 opponent, like it usually does.

If BYU goes to the Las Vegas Bowl, the Poinsettia Bowl gets the first selection of which Mountain West team it wants, but that doesn't necessarily mean it takes the winner of Saturday's conference championship game between San Diego State and Air Force.

To complicate matters further, the Mountain West has a backup agreement with the Cactus Bowl to play in Tempe, Arizona should the Big 12 or Pac-12 not fill all their bowl spots. That's a likely scenario because Oklahoma is expected to play in the College Football Playoff, freeing up a spot.

PICK 'EM: Make your own picks for MW bowl selections

Confused yet?

So is everyone else.

It should also be noted that San Jose State still has an outside shot of making a bowl game at 5-7. Because not enough teams will reach the six-win mark this year to fill the 80 possible bowls, the NCAA decided Monday that it will use Academic Progress Rate scores to prioritize which five-win teams will play in the postseason. Because Missouri opted out, the Spartans have the fourth-best APR behind Nebraska, Minnesota and Kansas State. (We're projecting San Jose State does not make a bowl.)

Here are the bowl games we're expecting Mountain West teams to play in this year.

NOTE: These projections were updated at 4:50 p.m. Tuesday.