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We were fortunate to get the bowl bid we got in '94 by tf86

Very fortunate, indeed.

To recap: that was the final year of the Bowl Coalition. ND was guaranteed a bid in the Bowl Coalition so long as we were bowl-eligible. We wound up in the Fiesta Bowl, which picked last among the first tier Coalition bowls. The Fiesta Bowl passed over two ranked teams -- Virginia Tech and North Carolina -- which wound up in the Sun and Gator Bowls, respectively.

Small consolation, I suppose, but to our credit, at least we avoided the blowout loss. Texas Tech, which was unranked and faced USC in the Cotton Bowl, did not, even though we had managed to tie USC in the final week of the regular season.

As I said earlier, that was the final year of the Bowl Coalition. ND nearly missing bowl eligibility in 1994 probably was one factor in its demise. But I think an even bigger factor was the impending formation of the Big XII conference. The Big 8 and SWC each had two bids in the Bowl Coalition. There was no way the Coalition would give four bids to the Big XII, nor were they terribly enthused at the prospect of inviting either the WAC or C-USA.