In somewhat of a Christmas miracle, the Rutgers football team will be playing No. 17/20 Wake Forest in the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl on Friday morning at 11:00 a.m. in Jacksonville, Fla.
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Rutgers ended the regular season without six victories and didn’t initially make a bowl game as there were enough bowl-eligible teams to fill all of the bowl slots.
That was until COVID forced the Demon Deacon’s original opponent, Texas A&M, to drop out. Because of its high APR scores (Rutgers was No. 1 among 5-7 teams), Rutgers had first dibs and accepted a bid to play on New Year’s Eve.
That’s better than Wisconsin and other Big Ten programs that had much better seasons.
“I told you guys how excited I am and our team is to have another opportunity to get together and play a game and to do it in a bowl as prestigious as the Gator Bowl is really special for us,” Rutgers head coach Greg Schiano said earlier this week.
It’s only been a week since the Scarlet Knights officially joined the fold, but there were a lot of their plates quickly. Coaches scrambled to formulate game plans, the players finished up final exams, and those in charge had to acquire transportation and hotels (multiple times).
Christmas was also this past Saturday which didn’t allow for the team to practice right away until Sunday. The schedule has been tight and jam-packed, but nobody would have it any other way.
“Our guys have been great. It's been fun, it's crazy, it's hectic. We're trying to do a month's worth of work in a week's space. Everyone is doing an incredible job. The most important thing is our players. They've been so much fun to be around. We're having a blast getting ready to play a really good team. It's gonna be a huge challenge, but we're fired up about it. …We'll get down to Florida and go play.”
Last summer, Rutgers gearing up for the 2020 season until it was cancelled and then brought back. Rutgers had ample time to get ready then and it has ample time to get ready again this time around.
The Scarlet Knights are also still dealing with COVID as is every other team and person in the nation. They’ve had to pivot before.
Rutgers defeated Michigan State in the opener last October and won two more games in a Big Ten-only schedule in the first year of the rebuild under Schiano 2.0.
“I am pleased and I would tell you that everyday has been fun and strange,” Schiano said. “We think we have a plane, and then we have two planes, and then we have no planes. That's all between trying to get the offense, defense and special teams ready. There's always these walls that come up.
“But I told our staff, look, we are not going to get bent out of shape. We're built to do this. Let's just roll with the punches. Whatever comes down, the pipe will adjust and play a game and have a lot of fun doing it. We want to win the game. That's why we're going there. It'll be a great experience for our players, but when you put as much into it as our guys are putting into it, you're going to win the game. That's what I'm looking forward to.”
Follow Chris Nalwasky on Twitter @ChrisNalwasky.
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