BY BARRY ALVAREZ
UW Director of Athletics

MADISON, Wis. — I always looked at a bowl game as a reward for a good season. You want it to be a special experience for everyone. But, particularly, you want to honor your seniors.

We've had a great season, a surprising season for a lot of people, other than the players and the coaches. To top it all off, we're playing in a New Year's Six game.

Trust me, it's very hard to get into this position — one of the Top 10 teams in the country — and yet it has seemed to get lost in the shuffle. You hardly hear anyone talking about us in those terms.

In our case, maybe it's because we're playing a MAC opponent, a team outside the Power Five, a team maybe our fans don't identify with. What people forget is that Western Michigan is undefeated.

If you're playing a Florida State or an Oklahoma, maybe it's perceived differently. But nobody should take our opponent lightly. I know that we won't. We're facing a high-scoring, good football team.

Nobody should undersell the Cotton Bowl, either. These people invented hospitality. It will be a tremendous experience for our student-athletes. You start with the seniors because you're rewarding them.

You're also giving all the younger players a chance to compete one more time. It's a way to develop your team for the future. I know that Paul (Chryst) is a big believer in this approach.

I've pointed it out many times that our win over Southern Cal in the Holiday Bowl gave us the momentum going into this season. There were so many positives that came out of that game.

One of our linebackers, Jack Cichy, played only in the second half, but he had a huge impact with three sacks in three plays.

All of a sudden, he's on the map. The bowl game gave him confidence and it gave the coaches confidence in him. And he was lighting it up this year before he got hurt. That's just one example.

You saw our young offensive linemen improve so much. The redshirt freshmen kids really played well against USC. They took another step. I think you'll see the same thing again this year.

I've talked about it several times: teams can change from the end of the regular season to the bowl. There are a lot of potential distractions and reasons for that happening.

The players could be disappointed in the bowl; they're not happy about going to a particular site. Or, you could have seniors more worried about the draft than playing. That changes a team.

You could also have guys getting into trouble at the site distracting your team from concentrating on the game. You could have assistants who are leaving and that's a distraction.

Sometimes a coach can work his guys too hard. He puts them through a grind and the kids are thinking, "This is supposed to be a reward and we're getting killed." And they go into the bowl grumpy.

I've been through all of that. As a head coach, I would explain to the kids what we were going to do, what was expected of them and when they were going to have free time.

I wanted to expose and educate them to wherever we were in the country. I wanted them to experience it all and I'd tell them, "I was an idiot when I played at Nebraska and I didn't care."

That's why I remind players to take advantage of what the bowl and community offers because you may never again be in that position. But understand this, "We're going there to win the game."

I understand the business end of the sport, too. I know what has happened with a few players (Stanford's Christian McCaffrey and LSU's Leonard Fournette have opted to not play in their bowls).

I understand the health considerations. But I don't happen to agree with it.

I would have probably been disappointed if Melvin Gordon told me before his last game, the 2015 Outback Bowl, "I don't want to play because I'm more concerned about my future than playing with my teammates."

In the end, I know it all worked out well for Melvin.