Today begins a nearly three week smorgasbord of college football bowl games, starting with the Eagle Bank Bowl featuring Wake Forest and Navy and ending with the Jan. 8 FedEx BCS National Championship game between Florida and Oklahoma.

While this year’s participants will feature the likes of Southern Cal, Texas, Ohio State and, locally, Clemson and South Carolina, there are a number of former football powers that will be staying home for the holidays. Some programs are experiencing their first “bowless” season in many years while others have fallen into college football’s black hole — where teams such as the NFL’s Detriot Lions and Cleveland Browns can relate.

The following is a list of those once perennial bowl teams that have plunged from the penthouse to the outhouse:

• Tennessee — This program that once hoisted the 1998 National Championship Trophy, has become a shell of itself in recent years. The Vols finished 5-6 in 2005 and wins over Vanderbilt and Kentucky in their final two games this season kept Tennessee from finishing even worse. Still, a 5-7 record cost longtime head coach Phillip Fulmer his job and proves that even the best of programs will experience hard times. I wouldn’t count out new coach Lane Kiffin, although he will face a more hostile boss than the one — Al Davis — he left behind as the former head coach of the Oakland Raiders. More than 100,000 fans won’t hesitate to show their displeasure if Kiffin’s start proves rocky and it won’t take an overhead projector like the one Davis used after firing Kiffin to spell it out

• Auburn — A year ago, the Chick-fil-A Bowl featured two Tommys as head coach, Bowden at Clemson and Turbeville at Auburn. Now, both coaches are gone as Bowden stepped down in October and Turbeville “resigned” shortly after Auburn’s lopsided loss to Alabama. While school administrators have been licking their chops for several years waiting for the day they could throw Turbeville out on his ear, Auburn fans can’t be happy that Gene Chisik, the school’s former defensive coordinator and recent head coach at Iowa State, will now be running the show having lost 19 of his first 24 games as a college head coach

• Michigan — Even when the Wolverines experienced off years in the past, those records typically resembled 8-4 or, at worst, a 6-6 record when they lost to Brigham Young during BYU’s national championship clinching victory in 1984. However, this year’s team experienced a 3-9 freefall under new head coach Rich Rodriguez. This marks the first time Michigan has failed to qualify for a bowl since 1974 and you can bet the heat will be turned up on Rodriguez even more in 2009

• Arkansas — When former Louisville and Atlanta Falcons head coach Bobby Petrino bolted to the Razorbacks last December, he became one of the most despised coaches this side of Ken Hatfield. Fittingly, his first year in Fayetteville saw only slight improvement, at 5-7, than the 3-10 mark he posted with the Atlanta Falcons during a stint that failed to last the entire season. But the Hogs at least have something to hang their hats on for next season as they upset defending national champion LSU 31-30 in their final game

• Arizona State — After last year’s successful season produced a Holiday Bowl bid, Dennis Erickson’s Sun Devils looked like a surefire bowl team this season. But a pre-season Top 25 ranking turned into a 5-7 finish. The Sun Devils even lost to arch-rival Arizona 31-10, making this one of the least pleasant years in the mostly sterling college head coaching career of Dennis Erickson. Note I said college and omitted the mediocre NFL coaching record Erickson accumulated with the Seattle Seahawks and San Francisco 49ers

• Virginia — This program once could be counted upon to at least make some type of bowl, even if it wasn’t a BCS. Now, the Cavaliers, which once challenged for the national championship in 1999 aren’t even the champions of their own state as Virginia Tech has repeatedly whipped them like yard dogs. Although head coach Al Groh was spared the ax following a 5-7 campaign that saw the Cavs lose to Clemson and the Hokies in their final two games, his contract again was not extended and his son was among the assistant coaches sent packing. Another effort like this next season could find Groh joining former Kansas State head coach, and one-time UVA assistant, Ron Prince on the unemployment line. To think, this program once produced quarterback Matt Shaub, running backs Tiki Barber, Thomas Jones and Terry Kirby and wide receiver Herman Moore

• Colorado — This one time national power that won the AP National Championship (Georgia Tech won what was then the UPI title) in 1990, despite a controversial fifth-down play against Missouri, has fallen on hard times since Bill McCartney left. While McCartney successors Rick Neuheisel and Gary Barnett experienced some success, it was off-the-field player problems that led to the demise of the Golden Buffaloes. Although successor Dan Hawkins achieved a 53-11 in five seasons at the helm of Boise State, he has been unable to duplicate that success, so far, in Boulder. After three seasons, Hawkins has compiled a 13-24 record that includes an 11-14 mark with his son, Cody, as the starting quarterback

• Texas A&M — Once the number two college football program in Texas, behind the University of Texas, the Aggies are a prime example of why it’s important to be careful what one wishes for. A&M supporters felt coach R.C. Slocum’s 14-year record of 123-47-2, 11 bowl appearances, three championships in the now defunct Southwest conference and the 1998 Big 12 Championship weren’t enough. However, those same individuals might be singing a different tune these days as Dennis Franchione could only muster a 32-28 record and three bowls in five years (he didn’t even get to coach in last year’s Alamo Bowl) and a 4-8 mark under first-year head coach Mike Sherman — formerly of Green Bay — this season. Now, the Aggies aren’t even second best in the Longhorn State as a one-loss Texas Tech team holds that distinction

• UCLA — Like the Aggies, the Bruins have always played second fiddle and in the case of UCLA, it’s USC. However, former coach Terry Donahue’s 144-81 record included three Rose Bowl victories and produced NFL talent such as Troy Aikman, Kenny Easley, Randy Cross, Jonathan Ogden and Manu Tuiasosopo. Successor Bob Toledo enjoyed a respectable 49-32 record but never reached the heights of success as Donahue and the last two coaches — Karl Dorrell and Rick Neuheisel — have combined for a 39-34 record over the past six seasons

• Washington — It’s hard to believe the Huskies were once a Pac 10 power and even won one-half of a national championship in 1991. Fast forward 17 years and you have a program in complete disarray, failing to win even once in 12 games this season. There are several reasons for the demise of this program, including the fallout from Neuheisel’s firing for betting on the 2003 NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball Tournament in a bracket pool.

As further evidence of how badly things have gone in Seattle, the Huskies have failed to earn a Bowl berth of any kind since 2002. That’s almost unheard of in this gluttonous age of bowls.

Of course, the odds are that programs like Tennessee and Michigan will bounce back next season — there is just too much tradition at those universities to suggest otherwise. But Washington is a prime example of how difficult it can be to revitalize a program that has been downtrodden for so long. That could be the danger that Auburn, Colorado, UCLA and, perhaps, Arkansas, face.

That’s why Clemson and USC fans, though they have a right to be somewhat disappointed in their respective seasons considering the high pre-season expectations, should take a look at these programs just named. While there are the Oklahomas, Floridas and Southern Cals that most seek to emulate, there are also the Washingtons of the world that bring bowl season into perspective. No matter what happens to the Tigers and Gamecocks in their respective bowl games against Nebraska and Iowa, things could always be worse.

Just ask a Huskies fan.