We Now Know The 2026-27 Bowl Schedule. Where Will The Heisman Fit In?

We’ve made it to June, which might as well be July Jr., which is awfully close to August, which is when the college football season starts.

It’s right around the corner! Our appetites were whet this week with the release Wednesday (June 3) of the 2026-27 bowl schedule. Revel in it here.

In my day, Heisman winners (and every other player) got the chance to play in one bowl per season, max. The College Football Playoff changed that in 2014.

Just months ago, 2025 Heisman winner Fernando Mendoza became the first Heisman winner to play in three postseason games, leading the Hoosiers to wins in the Rose Bowl (CFP quarterfinals), the Peach Bowl (CFP semifinals) and CFP National Championship, which doesn’t have the word Bowl in it, but we think it should count.

All three performances — wins over Alabama, Oregon and Miami — are among the greatest by a Heisman winner in bowl history. He had more TD passes than incompletions in respective blowout wins over the Crimson Tide and the Ducks (a combined 8 TDs to five incompletions). Against the Hurricanes, it was his 12-yard spinning, fourth-down, fourth-quarter TD burst that became instant college football lore.

Under the current 12-team format, it’s not out of the realm of possibility that a future Heisman winner could play four postseason games. It’s unlikely, but so was the Hoosiers’ historic and joyous 2025 season. Yet here we are.

The 2026 Heisman winner’s bowl fate is unwritten, just like his season. He could end up in a first-round game less than a week after the Heisman ceremony on Dec. 18, or a quarterfinal game on Dec. 30 or Jan. 1 hosted by the Fiesta, Cotton, Rose or Peach Bowls.

The Orange and Sugar Bowls will serve as semifinal sites on Jan. 14 and 15, respectively, ahead of the CFP title game on Jan. 25.

Possibly, the Heisman winner will play in the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl on Dec. 21 in Boise, or the Bad Boy Mowers Pinstripe Bowl in New York on Dec. 26, which starts two hours earlier than the the nearby Wasabi Fenway Bowl. Maybe the Pop-Tarts Bowl on Dec. 29 will get its first Heisman appearance.

Will the next Heisman winner be throwing citrus spirals out of the Orange Bowl trophy or maybe biting down on a long stem rose after a victory in Pasadena?

In 2024, Travis Hunter became just the second Heisman winner to play in the Alamo Bowl, following in Robert Griffin III’s 2011 footsteps.

Jayden Daniels did not play in LSU’s bowl in 2023, opting out as he began prep work for the 2024 draft. He was the first Heisman winner not to play in a bowl game since Andre Ware in 1989, when the Cougars were under NCAA probation.

The last Heisman winner to play in the Cotton Bowl is Caleb Williams  (2022) while the last Heisman winner to play in the Fiesta Bowl is Rashaan Salaam (1994). As mentioned, Mendoza hit both the Rose and Peach Bowls last year.

Kyler Murray (2018) is the last Heisman winner to play in the Orange Bowl while fellow Sooner Baker Mayfield is the last winner to play in the Sugar Bowl the same season of his trophy win.

But we’re looking ahead and need to be more patient. We’ve got a lot of summer still to go.