The season of Thanksgiving, Christmas shopping and Notre Dame following.

Happens every year around this time. Because the Fighting Irish are bowl partners with the Big East, fans of the conference's teams suddenly remember the setup, hop on their computers and punch up Notre Dame's record. If it's worthy of a bowl, there is outcry.

Well, this year the leprechauns of Brian Kelly are 5-5. They need one win to qualify for a bowl. They play host to 6-4 Army Saturday before visiting USC, now 7-3, to complete the regular season. Notre Dame is an 8-1/2 point favorite against the Black Knights this week.

I can hear the groans now from New York state to Tampa, Fla. If your team doesn't win the Big East title and, thus, the league's BCS bowl berth, it will tumble past Orlando's Champs Sports Bowl and into the Meineke Car Care Bowl, aka the Tire Bowl, or below.

The reason?

(All together now.)

Every bowl wants Notre Dame.

Fear not, though, Big East acolytes. The Champs Sports Bowl will almost certainly go to a league team, and if WVU wins a couple more games, it, with such a strong bowl following, will be a very strong contender.

Here's the deal: The Big East champ goes to a BCS bowl, most likely the Fiesta Bowl, which has the last at-large pick, against the Big 12 champ (think Nebraska, Oklahoma or Oklahoma State). After that, the Orlando bowl gets the pick. Then you get into the land of Meineke, New Era Pinstripe, BBVA Compass, Beef O'Brady's and AutoZone Liberty bowls.

The Champs Sports Bowl can grab Notre Dame instead of a Big East team once every four years. Unlike some past bowl contracts, there is no two-win separation rule.

So, you reason, that points to the Champs grabbing the Irish, right?

"No,'' said bowl CEO Steve Hogan on Tuesday. "The only way we'd look at a 6-6 Notre Dame team is if the other available Big East teams are 6-6.

"We're hoping for a nine-game or eight-game winner. I don't see any possible way we'd take a 6-6 [Notre Dame] team. Obviously, if they run the table, they'd be on our board at 7-5. But Syracuse, South Florida and West Virginia all have the chance to get nine wins.

"We really like to look at a team that deserves to be there."

Refreshing, no? OK, OK. But here's where I must tell the rest of the story, as Paul Harvey used to say. According to Big East associate commissioner John Paquette, Notre Dame has to be 7-5 in order to play in the bowl. He says it's in the contract.

Kind of spoils this from Hogan.

"At 6-6 we're not going to take them regardless of who they are," he said of the Irish. "It doesn't matter if it's Notre Dame, West Virginia, Syracuse or anybody. We want a winning team in Orlando."

Regardless of the 7-5 rule, though, it really did sound like Hogan wants the best available team. It didn't sound like other bowl presidents I've interviewed that almost drooled over the Irish.

"Look," Hogan said, "we've got a four-year contract. Somewhere we'll probably get a good look at Notre Dame. We want a team, though, in which I can look the athletic director in the eye and say, 'You deserve to be here.' "

I know there's not a lot of sympathy in the Mountain State for Pitt, but one has to feel for Panthers defensive end Greg Romeus, who was projected as one of the best NFL prospects at his position.

Romeus, last season's Big East co-defensive player of the year, returned to the field last week after missing seven games following lower back surgery. Then, in the Panthers' loss to Connecticut, he tore an ACL and is done for the season.

There wasn't a whole bunch Cincinnati coach Butch Jones could say after his team's 37-10 loss to West Virginia. Something he did say this week, however, was one of the Bearcats' four turnovers in the game shouldn't have been called so. He pointed to the muffed punt near the start of the game that was given to WVU.

"Looking at the video replay, it didn't even hit our guy," Jones said. "It hit a West Virginia player."

And finally . . .

For those unaware, the end of the Tevita Finau saga is finally being written. As WVU fans know, Finau was the highly regarded recruit that signed with the Mountaineers, oh, let's say more than once before dropping out of sight. The word is he simply couldn't get in the school.

Well, he could get into Utah. He's playing as a junior this season for the Utes and is listed as a backup at left defensive end. He's played in six games and started one at right end versus TCU.

His stats? Two solo tackles and two assisted tackles.

Another recruiting lesson we've learned.

Reach Mitch Vingle at 304-348-4827, mitchvin...@wvgazette.com or follow him at http://twitter.com/MitchVingle.