NCAA by-laws state that a school with a record of 6–6 in regular season play is eligible only if conferences cannot fill out available positions for bowl games with teams possessing seven (or more) wins (excluding games played in Hawaii and conference championship games in the ACC, Big 12, Conference USA, Mid-American Conference and the SEC).
An example was in 2008 when the Big Ten, the Big 12 and SEC each had two teams selected for the Bowl Championship Series games – Ohio State and Penn State from the Big Ten, Texas and Oklahoma from the Big 12 and Alabama and Florida from the SEC.
With each conference sending two teams to the BCS, these three conferences forfeited several bowl game slots due to a lack of teams with a winning record.

As with the 2006 and 2008 seasons, all eligible teams with at least 7 wins made it in to a bowl game.
Of the 71 eligible teams, only 68 could play in a game, and all three eligible teams that sat out bowl season were 6-6: Louisiana-Lafayette, Louisiana-Monroe, and Notre Dame, who opted not to play in a bowl game themselves after the firing of head coach Charlie Weis.

For the first time in BCS history, every participant in a BCS bowl was ranked in the top 10 of the final BCS standings.
NCAA by-laws state that a school with a record of 6–6 in regular season play is eligible only if conferences cannot fill out available positions for bowl games with teams possessing seven (or more) wins (excluding games played in Hawaii and conference championship games in the ACC, Big 12, Conference USA, Mid-American Conference and the SEC). An example was in 2008 when the Big Ten, the Big 12 and SEC each had two teams selected for the Bowl Championship Series games – Ohio State and Penn State from the Big Ten, Texas and Oklahoma from the Big 12 and Alabama and Florida from the SEC. With each conference sending two teams to the BCS, these three conferences forfeited several bowl game slots due to a lack of teams with a winning record.
As with the 2006 and 2008 seasons, all eligible teams with at least 7 wins made it in to a bowl game. Of the 71 eligible teams, only 68 could play in a game, and all three eligible teams that sat out bowl season were 6-6: Louisiana-Lafayette, Louisiana-Monroe, and Notre Dame, who opted not to play in a bowl game themselves after the firing of head coach Charlie Weis.
For the first time in BCS history, every participant in a BCS bowl was ranked in the top 10 of the final BCS standings.
2009–10 NCAA football bowl games