Alamo Bowl could snag Pac-10, leave Holiday Bowl to Big Ten?

College football's middle-tier bowl structure seems likely to head toward another seismic shift in 2010.

Nearly every bowl agreement expires following the 2009-2010 season. Several bowls are looking at jumping other bowls to get bigger and more high-profile match-ups in the four-year cycle from 2010 through 2014.

San Antonio's Alamo Bowl has been the most aggressive during the recent round of discussions. The Alamo Bowl has offered the Pac-10 a reportedly $3 million to host the league's top non-BCS school. The agreement would elbow out the Big Ten, which has sent a school to San Antonio for 15 consecutive years. It would also send the Holiday Bowl, which currently hosts the Pac-10's top non-BCS team, scurrying for a new relationship. That could include a Big Ten return to the San Diego-based bowl.

Rick Hill, the Alamo Bowl's vice president of marketing and communications, said his bowl wants to increase its visibility with better matchups. The Alamo Bowl currently pits the Big 12 and Big Ten's No. 4 or No. 5 teams.

"We've told both conferences we have an interest in moving up," Hill said. "We want to respect the order of the incumbents, but please ask us if there's availability to move up.

"We feel we can do as well or better with a chance to move up."

The Alamo Bowl has outperformed its bowl ranking, both financially and in television ratings. The 2006 Alamo Bowl featuring Texas and Iowa was a sell-out and produced ESPN's best-ever bowl ratings.

This year the Alamo Bowl ranked No. 8 among non-BCS bowls in terms of payout at $3.85 million to its teams. According to its most recent available tax returns in 2008, it showed a $2.4 million profit with nearly $8.31 million in revenue in 2008. It also carries more than $8.2 million in assets. Those are significantly better numbers than many other bowls.

The Holiday Bowl produced $7 million in revenue and cleared a $160,000 profit, according to its 2008 tax returns. The Holiday Bowl spent nearly $4.9 million in payouts last year. Non-BCS mainstays the Capital One Bowl ($12.4 million) and Cotton Bowl ($9.4 million) generated more revenue but had smaller profits than the Alamo Bowl. 

Hill wouldn't talk specifically about the Pac-10 proposal and said the bowl still is talking to the Big 12 and Big Ten.

"I think at this point, you want to talk about all options," Hill said. "What's going to get us the highest quality game? We obviously want to put on a good product for a local and national audience.

"We've talked to all conferences, but we've focused energies on our two partner ones. We won't know until negotiations wrap up and we're able to figure out what we've got for the four years after this one."

The Holiday Bowl currently hosts the Pac-10's best non-BCS team against the Big 12's second-best non-BCS school. It could snag the Big Ten's third-best non-BCS school should it lose the Pac-10 or the Big 12 during this round of talks. The Big Ten sent its second- or third-best team to the Holiday Bowlevery year from 1986-94.

"We've had a great with the Big 12 and we have every intention of pursuing it and keeping that," said Bruce Binkowski, the Holiday Bowl's executive director. "But we need to leave all of our options open. We certainly wouldn't close the door on the Big Ten if we had a good opportunity there."