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FAU will play Akron in the 2017 Boca Raton Bowl

The Conference USA Champs will play their first bowl game in almost a decade at home.

Conference USA Championship - North Texas v Florida Atlantic Photo by Rob Foldy/Getty Images

For the first time since 2008, FAU will play in a bowl game and to the surprise of the FAU faithful, the Owls will be staying home to host the Akron Zips in the 2017 Boca Raton Bowl. The Boca Raton Bowl will take place on December 19th.

Akron finished the season 7-6 after losing the MAC Championship Game to Toledo. They are led by former Auburn head coach Terry Bowden. The Zips are 2-4 on the road this season.

FAU is 10-3 and fresh off of winning their first ever Conference USA Championship Game. Seeing FAU matched up with a sub .500 MAC team is disappointing. But knowing that the football team will be staying home this postseason instead of playing elsewhere is even more upsetting.

Southern Miss ended up in Shreveport to play Florida State and received by far the best draw out of Conference USA’s teams. Unless the players themselves wanted to play in the Boca Bowl, ending up here is an absolute failure by the FAU administration. This historical season deserved a better finish than this.

With that said, this bowl game gives the university a huge opportunity to market itself. After having somewhere around 14,000 attend the Conference USA Championship Game, the FAU fan base has another opportunity to support the football team on a big state.

FAU will be the favorite and should put on a show. The Boca Bowl is not what FAU fans wanted, but we’re here and we might as well make the most of it.