It’s the most wonderful time of the year ... college football bowl season!

Eighty FBS teams will play in 40 bowls before the College Football Playoff National Championship.

Which teams are most likely to win these games? ESPN’s Football Power Index (FPI) has you covered with projections and a confidence meter for all 40 FBS bowl games.

FPI Bowl Projections Date Bowl FPI

Favorite FPI

Underdog Favorite

Chance To Win Dec. 17 New Mexico Bowl New Mexico Texas San Antonio 66.0% Dec. 17 Las Vegas Bowl Houston San Diego State 58.8% Dec. 17 Camellia Bowl Toledo Appalachian State 50.3% Dec. 17 AutoNation Cure Bowl UCF Arkansas State 62.5% Dec.17 New Orleans Bowl Southern Miss Louisiana Lafayette 61.7% Dec. 19 Miami Beach Bowl Tulsa Central Michigan 70.5% Dec. 20 Boca Raton Bowl Western Kentucky Memphis 58.7% Dec. 21 Poinsettia Bowl BYU Wyoming 77.7% Dec. 22 Idaho Potato Bowl Colorado State Idaho 68.6% Dec. 23 Popeyes Bahamas Bowl Old Dominion Eastern Michigan 63.4% Dec. 23 Armed Forces Bowl Louisiana Tech Navy 50.4% Dec. 23 Dollar General Bowl Troy Ohio 63.7% Dec. 24 Hawai'I Bowl Middle Tennessee Hawai'I 58.8% Dec. 26 St. Petersburg Bowl Mississippi State Miami (Ohio) 81.9% Dec. 26 Quick Lane Bowl Maryland Boston College 51.0% Dec. 26 Independence Bowl NC State Vanderbilt 52.5% Dec. 27 Heart Of Dallas Bowl Army North Texas 73.8% Dec. 27 Military Bowl Pres.

By Northrop Grumman Temple Wake Forest 69.7% Dec. 27 Holiday Bowl Washington State Minnesota 70.5% Dec. 27 Cactus Bowl Boise State Baylor 58.6% Dec. 28 Pinstripe Bowl Pittsburgh Northwestern 63.2% Dec. 28 Russell Athletic Bowl Miami West Virginia 56.0% Dec. 28 Foster Farms Bowl Utah Indiana 74.5% Dec. 28 Texas Bowl Texas A&M Kansas State 62.8% Dec. 29 Birmingham Bowl South Florida South Carolina 71.4% Dec. 29 Belk Bowl Virginia Tech Arkansas 66.4% Dec. 29 Valero Alamo Bowl Colorado Oklahoma State 50.9% Dec. 30 AutoZone Liberty Bowl TCU Georgia 56.0% Dec. 30 Hyundai Sun Bowl Stanford North Carolina 52.8% Dec. 30 Music City Bowl Tennessee Nebraska 67.2% Dec. 30 Arizona Bowl Air Force South Alabama 77.4% Dec. 30 Capital One Orange Bowl Michigan Florida State 62.1% Dec. 31 TaxSlayer Bowl Georgia Tech Kentucky 59.3% Dec. 31 Buffalo Wild Wings

Citrus Bowl Louisville LSU 51.1% Dec. 31 Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl -

CFP Semifinal Alabama Washington 68.2% Dec. 31 PlayStation Fiesta Bowl -

CFP Semifinal Ohio State Clemson 55.2% Jan. 2 Goodyear

Cotton Bowl Classic Wisconsin Western Michigan 61.1% Jan. 2 Outback Bowl Florida Iowa 53.1% Jan. 2 Rose Bowl Game Pres.

By Northwestern Mutual USC Penn State 62.0% Jan. 2 Allstate Sugar Bowl Oklahoma Auburn 53.4%

Naturally, many will question whether these bowl projections even work. Our answer: This season, the FPI favorite has won 73 percent of FBS games, which is a higher success rate than that of the Las Vegas closing line.

Bowl season is a different beast to forecast, however, with far fewer mismatches than the regular season. There are also a few other factors such as the long layoff and different motivational factors that make bowls less predictable. FPI has a slightly different bowl model than the one it uses in the regular season to account for this unpredictability.

How has that model performed? The FPI favorite won 64 percent of games over the past three bowl seasons, and 73 percent of bowls last season. In comparison, the Las Vegas favorite has won 61 percent of games during that time, and its favorite is 6-12 when it differs from FPI’s favorite.

In terms of Bowl Mania, our FPI-based entries (picks and confidence based on biggest favorite) finished in at least the 90th percentile in each of the past two seasons.

We aren’t guaranteeing a win in your pool, or suggesting you follow FPI exactly, but here are some notable projections to watch:

• One thing that jumps out in the projections above is how close many of the games are expected to be. There are seven different games in which the FPI favorite is favored by less than one point, the most such games in at least the past 10 seasons.

• In the national semifinals, FPI projects that Alabama has a 68 percent chance to beat Washington in the Peach Bowl and Ohio State has a 55 percent chance to beat Clemson in the Fiesta Bowl.

• Michigan, Wisconsin, USC and Oklahoma are favored in the rest of the New Year’s Six bowls, but in contrast to last year’s blowouts, each of those games is expected to be decided by fewer than five points.

• Conference bragging rights? The American Athletic Conference has the highest projected winning percentage (.607) of any conference this bowl season.

• The SEC is sending 12 teams, including 5-7 Mississippi State, to bowls this season, which is tied for the most ever by one conference. Unlike last season, however, when the SEC went 9-2 with a plus-16 scoring margin, the SEC is expected to go about .500 in this season's bowls.

• Mississippi State, BYU and Air Force are the most likely teams to win their bowls. They are the only teams with at least a 75 percent chance to win. Over the past two seasons, the FPI favorite went 18-2 in the 20 games FPI was most confident in picking.

Now, let the fun of bowl season begin ...