In this age of parity, limited scholarships, and the bowl system, a college football program that has been terrible for years has the potential to put together a string of good seasons and go from scrap heap to relevant.

Even this soon after the bowl season, before recruiting is even finished, there are eight teams who stick out as having the potential to be strong dark horse teams to really turn things around next year and go from the scrap heap to competitive, a winning record, or even a bowl game. Here they are, in a vague reverse order of likelihood to break out.

Duke Blue Devils: And another head coach bites the dust. Ted Roof managed to get some higher level recruits to Duke, and this team played hard this season. Not only did they beat the 6-6 Northwest, but they took Miami, Navy, Virginia, Wake Forest, and North Carolina down to the wire. Trouble is, they didn't win any of those games.

The Blue Devils hired Tennessee offensive coordinator David Cutcliffe as the new head coach. If he can make Erik Ainge look like a legitimate quarterback, he should do wonders for this Duke team, who returns young QB Thaddeus Lewis, a player who had a great season and is only a sophomore. In an extremely weak ACC, a good passing system could be enough to get over the hump and strike at a 6-6 record.

With how bad Duke has been, anything close to 6-6 would be a boon for this long suffering program.

Temple Owls: This season was a definite improvement over the one win season of a year ago. The Owls won four games, including a winning streak in the MAC that shows that the rebuilding process in Temple is definitely taking shape. This is a very young team, and in the MAC anyone can surge forward to get a chance at the MAC title. This team has gone from 0 wins to 1 win to 4 wins, and there are more and more under the radar recruits coming in. They still need to make a jump, but that's not as impossible a task as it once looked.

Buffalo Bulls: Head coach Turner Gil just received a two year extension. For a coach who has done what he's done: eliminate the blow outs and get Buffalo within striking distance of .500 (only a 3 point loss to bowl team Miami of Ohio prevented them from 6-6), an extension even without a winning season is warranted.

This is a team that plays rock solid defense, plays physical on offense, and doesn't make mistakes. Recruiting has been hard, though more athletes are beginning to make their way to the Bulls as they see this team turn around. Gil will have to keep upping the recruiting to make this team a force, but this isn't the pushover team it once was. A 5-3 record in conference shows that the Bulls may have a bright future in the MAC.

Nebraska Cornhuskers: Never thought you'd see this team on a rebuilding list, huh? Well two out of three years having losing seasons counts-especially when you give up over 5 TDs on defense 8 times. This team had only 5 wins and almost lost to Ball State. Bo Pelini is a great defensive coach, and that alone should make the defense at least respectable. The offense has some weapons, and while the Big 12 North has several up and coming teams, there isn't any one that sticks out enough as a huge road block. 6-6 and a bowl is not out of reach for the Cornhuskers next season.

Stanford Cardinals: How good a job is Coach Harbaugh doing at Stanford? This team won 4 games this season, including the biggest upset in college football history with an epic defeat of USC. Stanford also beat Cal, San Jose State, and Arizona-and came very close to topping TCU and Notre Dame. Harbaugh has nailed an amazing recruiting class, including a 4 star quarterback and wide receiver, as well as a solid group of 3 star athletes.

This is a well coached, well disciplined team, and the Pac-10 is competitive, but not as dominant as some initially thought. The Cardinals have as good a chance of anyone as getting to .500 or better, and with how hard this team plays, we may see them at 6 wins as early as next season.

Iowa State Cyclones: The season started out as rough as could be imagined for Gene Chizik and company, but by the end the Cyclones looked like a very competitive team. Despite being plagued by horrible kicking and terrible quarterback play, this team played Nebraska well before nearly upsetting two top ten teams in Missouri and Oklahoma. Instead of getting discouraged, they played harder and beat Kansas State before beating bowl team Colorado-coming back from a 21-0 deficit to do so!

ISU has a fantastic coaching staff, and with so many returning players and a year of the new system and weight lifting regiment under their belts (not to mention they drop Texas, Texas Tech, and Oklahoma from their schedules for Baylor, Texas A&M, and Oklahoma State) there is no reason to believe this season can't hit 6 or 7 wins next year-especially with a weak out of conference schedule whose biggest opponent is Iowa, an overrated team who ISU has owned this last decade (7-3).

Keep an eye on this team in the future.

SMU Mustangs: The best coaching hire of the off season was SMU's all or nothing gamble to pull head coach June Jones away from Hawaii. When June Jones first arrived to 0-11 Hawaii, a one season turn around resulted in a 9-3 record. Conference USA is not tough at all-and now with a bigger budget in talent rich Texas, there's no reason to believe that the wide open run and shoot Jones loves to run can't work just as well or even better here.

Will he turn them around in one season? It's hard to see that, especially with the lack of incoming recruits, but there is virtually no doubt that not only will June Jones get SMU back to .500, but they'll be competing every single season for a Conference USA title very soon.

Washington Huskies: Washington was 4-8, and 5 losses were by 7 points or less. The defense is aggressive, and QB Jake Locker is exciting to watch, even though he was injured half the season, and the AD needs to learn to schedule some cupcake non conference games (Ohio State and Boise State don't count).

Right now for all the hype, Jake Locker is overrated. He was injured, he is young, but if he had been able to throw an accurate deep pass, Washington would have won at least 9 games, and even been in a BCS bowl. If Jake Locker can get his arm under control and learn to throw an accurate deep ball, this team will instantly be dangerous.

They could have won all five of those close losses and been a 9 win team, but Locker was extremely inaccurate with the deep passes, and will need to learn to throw that pass to lead the Huskies to the next level.

Willingham needs a bowl to stay off the hot seat, and with a season of practice there's no reason the Huskies shouldn't win 7-8 games next season. If they don't, he'll be fired.

These are the eight dark horse college football teams that are poised to make some major noise sooner rather than later, and all should be fun to watch next season.

Maybe it's the wild success of NCAA Football video games that have caused it to happen. Maybe it's the 85 scholarship level that has caused parity, maybe it's because more and more brilliant coaches are snubbing Miami, Florida, for South Florida, or an NFL job for jobs like Iowa State, Rutgers, and Duke.

Whatever the reasons, more now than ever it is possible for an absolute bottom feeder, bottom of the scrap heap team to rebuild (or build for the first time). Now more than ever, some remarkable teams can make an unbelievable turnaround. I'm going to focus on teams that have especially turned in around in the last 2-3 years, as well as some teams (Temple, Buffalo, Duke) who are showing life for the first time this season.

#1: Rutgers: Greg Schiano came from Miami to one of the longest laughing stocks in college football history. He told the AD that he could change the culture over time, but he had to have just that: time. The first step was starting to snag all the enormous New Jersey talent that went elsewhere, and to build a system with a good defense, a good running game, and enough passing game to balance it out. Two years ago, with Mike Hart a senior at QB splitting time with freshman high recruit QB Mike Teel, Rutgers had their first winning season and went to their first bowl game. Since then, they achieved their first bowl victory, sent several players to the NFL, and are now consistently considered a top Big East team and a Top 25 threat. The future looks very bright for this team.

#2: USF: Currently starting at 7-1 after a 9-3 season with a freshman quarterback, everyone knows this team's story. 15 years ago, they didn't even exist. Coach Jim Leavitt had his office in a small trailer, and he was forced to take the "scraps" that powerhouses Florida, Florida State, and Miami didn't want, and that didn't get sniped by another team from out of state. In a decade this program went from not even existing to making a run that saw them ranked as high as #2 in the country. The acquisition of former ISU head coach Dan McCarney as a defensive line coach has paid huge dividends, and though they lost to Rutgers, this is a team that can beat the best (ask West Virginia and Auburn) and still has a great shot at a BCS bowl. In fact, they may now be the second best team in Florida.

#3: Wake Forest: After an unbelievable ten win season that no one saw coming, Wake came out of nowhere to win the ACC title and earn a BCS bowl bid. Though they don't have the same power this season as last, they still started off an impressive 5-2 and are almost a sure shoo in for their second straight bowl. They have done all this without major recruiting classes, and without major publicity. As this team experiences more of both, there's no telling how strong they could become, especially in a really weak ACC football conference.

#4: Kansas: Mangino has performed a miracle at Kansas. The biggest coach (literally) in the NCAA has done wonders with a long bottom feeder, allowing Kansas several winning seasons, and also bowl appearances. This season Kansas has finally found an offense to go with the defense, and they are rated in the top ten. The only undefeated team from the Big 12 this weekend, and have already beat their main rival, arch rival #24 Kansas State. This team doesn't have many graduating seniors, and there is no reason to believe they're going anywhere but up in a wide open Big 12 North.

#5: Mississippi State: Sylvester Croom inherited a disaster: a terrible SEC team in the country's toughest conference in the nation that was under severe NCAA scholarship and bowl restrictions. He told the AD he needed a full five years. After a couple of huge upsets his first season, the team's best players, several first day NFL first rounders left, but the sanctions and losing tradition continued. In his fourth year, it looks like Mississippi State may have finally turned the corner.

They started 4-4, with a big upset over SEC rival Auburn, and then went into a tough stretch of schedule against Kentucky, another ranked SEC rival. And, oh, was that upset beautiful! It's a tough final stretch, but the 5-4 Mississippi State team is hungry, and rival Ole Miss is definitely beatable, and with a bowl bid (read month extra of practice, extra money, and big time recruiting points), expected this team to win the required six games and go to their first bowl in years. With sanctions (because of the previous head coach) about to end, the future is bright.

#6: UCONN: UCONN has made the tough jump from I-AA to I-A. NFL QB Dan Orvlosky led the team to some early success, but the team has struggled to make the full transition. After a losing season and a resurgent Big East, UCONN was not expected to do much of anything, but a 6-1 start has them tied with the lead in the Big East. This is a strong team with the best defense they've ever had, and a solid running game. This isn't a great team, but they are solid, and have better depth on their roster than at anytime in the team's history. They will make a bowl, and they will keep building to relevancy-not bad for a team that was I-AA before 2000.

#7: Florida Atlantic: Yes, it is the Sun Belt, yes that is the biggest joke of a conference, but even the Sun Belt has some decent teams (ask all the "better" teams that have been upset by Troy State the last few years) but Florida Atlantic was a laughing stock last year, and now they're suddenly 4-4, and 3-0 in the Sun Belt. The non-conference schedule is full of killers. They managed to beat a terrible Minnesota team, but they lost to USF, Kentucky, and Oklahoma State. They played USF close, and will probably lose to Florida later this season: but these games will flood the coffers of Florida Atlantic's football team with much needed money, and they should beat everyone in the Sun Belt not named Troy State, giving them 7-8 wins and a chance at a bowl.

#8: Buffalo: Here we reach the teams that are literally just beginning to build off the scrap heap. Turner Gil, Nebraska legend, took over a program with no location, no history, little talent, bad facilities, and little selling point. During Gil's first season, Buffalo beat Temple 9-3 in a battle of bottom feeders, and Buffalo lost a lot of a games, but as opposed to losing by 50, powerhouses like Auburn were held to 30, and Buffalo wasn't shut out. Now a member of the MAC, Buffalo has already won 3 games, their best season since being I-A. They barely lost to Syracuse, and played Penn State and Baylor hard, even though they were outmatched. They also killed Temple this season, 42-7, and all three wins are against MAC opponents. Recruiting, or lack thereof, will make it nearly impossible, in theory, to keep the momentum going, but 3 wins is amazing with what's there so far, so anything is possible with this new coach.

#9: Temple: Temple was synonymous of losing tradition, and it was joked that with 117 teams in the NCAA, #116 could beat Temple by 30. After one upset victory last year, there were some decent recruits in Coach Al Groden's new class, and this season that has translated to 3 MAC wins, and a near victory over a solid UCONN team. Temple will be able to get far better recruiting than Buffalo, meaning in time they may still be able to overpass. Neither Temple nor Buffalo are last, both in fact have shots at .500, and that alone makes these two teams impressive.

#10: Duke: So how can a 1-6 team that hasn't had a winning season since Steve Spurrier be rebuilding? Looking closely, this is a team that has only had two years to recruit under coach Ted Roof, who has gotten some high profile recruits to Duke who no one expected. After losing every game last season (and getting shut out by I-AA Richmond), Duke has only one game, but they beat a solid Northwestern team, and had several very close losses against good teams. They lost 13-24 to Virginia (7-1), 43-46 in overtime to Navy (4-3), 14-24 to Miami (5-3) (who put it away with a late TD), and 36-41 to Wake Forest (6-2). Their freshman quarterback is a stud, and it's not out of the question to expect a bowl game out of this team next season.