Ruffin McNeill had known for weeks his football team would play in a bowl game, but perhaps the reality hadn’t truly hit the third-year East Carolina coach until he was able to fix on an opponent and a setting.

When he learned it will be a fellow 8-4 team, the Louisiana-Lafayette Ragin’ Cajuns, lining up against his team in the New Orleans Bowl on Dec. 22, McNeill seemed relieved and suddenly more aware of how much he missed the postseason after not being a part of it last season.

“All bowl games are exciting to me. I haven’t been in them in a while,” McNeill said on Sunday evening, confirming that the exchange of game films between the Pirates and Cajuns was already under way. “Not going to one last year makes you really excited.”

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