vs. 
Full name: The Texas Bowl
Match up: Big 12 vs Big East
Teams: Rutgers vs Kansas State
Location: Houston, TX
Date/Time: Thursday, December 28, 2006 - 7:00 p.m. (central) on the NFL Network
Venue: Reliant Stadium
Years in existence: This is the inaugural Texas Bowl, but it has been played as the galleryfurniture.com Bowl (from 2000-2001) and the EV1.net Houston Bowl (2002-2005)
Per Team Payout: $500,000 for the Big East and $750,000 for the Big 12
Endorsements:
Todd: It's a shame that the the Big East only gets $500k for their selection while the Big 12 takes home $750k considering Rutgers is the far superior team in this match. Kansas State (7-5) should get some credit for beating Texas, despite the fact that Colt McCoy was knocked out early in the game. Otherwise, they lost to every ranked team they played, including Big East champ Louisville, a team that Rutgers beat in one of the more exciting games of the season. Rutgers is riding a 10-2 mark, and should take this game over handily.
Nico:
Kansas State is another one of those teams that I dislike for no good reason. They've never played Alabama and I doubt they have ever impacted Alabama negatively in any way, shape, form or fashion on the football field. As far as Rutgers is concerned, I've been lapping up their rise to glory. I'm not sure I've ever seen a stadium rocking out as hard as when they beat Louisville at home this year. I'm cheering on the Scarlet Knights because their fans deserve it.
Irrational Bama Fan: Bama is 2-0 against Rutgers and has never played K State. In that sense, we'll just have to root for the team whose color scheme most closely resembles our own. Go Rutgers.