An ambitious agenda falls into place when a team attains bowl eligibility with games remaining.

Keep piling up the wins and get to a better bowl destination, preferably one in a warm weather stadium and played closer to New Year’s Day.

Boston College secured bowl eligibility with Friday night’s 17-10 victory over Syracuse at the JMA Wireless Dome. The ACC is aligned with 15 bowls, not counting the FBS playoffs, which will likely go to No. 4 Florida State if the Seminoles remain undefeated.

The ACC bowl structure has four tiers with the bottom four locations set aside for teams with the minimum six wins. BC (6-3, 3-2) can jump to the third tier with a victory over Virginia Tech (4-5, 3-2) on Saturday (noon) at Alumni Stadium. BC plays at Pittsburgh on Thursday, Nov. 16, and closes the season at home against Miami on the 24th.

“I think one of the goals every year is you want to get to a bowl game,” said BC coach Jeff Hafley during his weekly press briefing on Monday at the Yawkey Center.

“My message was we want to win more games, it’s not like we won six games and are now content. We have to get better and win more games. Any bowl game we go to we will be thrilled and do our best and respect the bowl.”

Boston College has had a checkered bowl run since 2018 and sixth-year graduate middle linebacker Vinny DePalma has been a witness to all them. DePalma was a true freshman in 2018 when BC was invited to play Boise State in the Servpro Bowl at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas, Texas. The game was cancelled with BC leading 7-0 in the first quarter when an apocalyptic lightning storm devastated the region.

The Eagles were in disarray when they were invited to play Cincinnati in the Birmingham Bowl the following season. Head coach Steve Addazio had just been fired and the Eagles were led by running backs coach Rich Gunnell. BC was pummeled 38-6 in a game that, ironically, was delayed two hours because of lightning.

BC (6-5) had played 11 straight games, 10 against the ACC, in 2020 while under a pandemic quarantine and they voted as a team not to participate in a bowl game.

The Eagles were slated to play East Carolina in the Military Bowl in Annapolis, Md., after the 2021 season. The game was cancelled when 40 BC players tested positive for COVID.

“It had kind of been a crazy string of bad luck between the games getting canceled and the weather and COVID,” said DePalma. “For a lot of the older guys, we are all very eager to play in the best bowl that we can and compete and have a lot of fun.”

Ball Hawk

Hafley built his resume as a defensive backfield coach collegiately at the Power-5 level and in the NFL with the 49ers, Browns, and Buccaneers.

Hafley knows what NFL teams are looking for in a defensive back and at present, Eagles cover corner Elijah Jones is meeting a lot of the criteria.

Jones, a 6-2, 184-pound graduate student from New York City was named the ACC’s Defensive Back of the Week for the second time after recording two interceptions against Syracuse, both on the BC side of the field and one in the end zone. Jones leads the ACC with five interceptions on the season, all against league opponents, with seven in his college career.

“The ball production is huge and anytime you go into one those NFL draft rooms with the GM and head coach, they always want to know if he can take the ball away,” said Hafley.

“In that league you’ve got to get the ball. The way they will see him is playing with confidence down the field and winning those contested catches.”

Next man up

BC leads the ACC in rushing with 212.2 yards per game, but the Eagles have suddenly become thin at tailback. Pat Garwo, who topped the depth chart at the start of the season, is out for the remainder of the year following surgery.

Both Kye Robichaux and Alex Broome were injured at Syracuse and their status for Virginia Tech is unclear. Practice squad tailback Andre Hines was summoned from the sidelines and he rushed for 32 yards on five carries against the Orange.