College football’s six-win rule to qualify for a bowl game is really dumb.

It’s unnecessary.

It’s contrary to what college athletics are traditionally all about. It only gives college execs and coaches a ready-made cop-out.

The rule — which says Division I-A teams must win six games against Division I-A opponents before a bowl invitation will be extended — will keep Iowa State from taking the field against Northern Iowa beyond Saturday’s game.

That’s a shame. It prevents a perfectly competitive match-up — heightened by UNI’s 2-0 winning streak — from taking place simply because of some bureaucrat’s fear that sub-par teams will get an undeserved chance at post-season play.

But the only reason a bad team would be extended a bowl invitation is if the Freedom Bowl people (purely as an example) thought they could make more money by inviting a 6-5 Notre Dame instead of an 8-3 Wyoming.

The bowl people’s money-hungry attitude is something they should fix by themselves instead of placing punitive rules on college football teams. It’s not college football’s problem if the they can’t control their purse-string urges.

What’s more, college football is all about rivalries like the ISU-Northern Iowa game. Barring the Cyclone-Hawkeye showdown, it’s probably the most heated of the year.

College football was founded on principles of competition and spirit, not an invitation to the Phillips 66/Nike/Pepsi/Old Milwaukee/Budget Rental Car Gator Bowl. It’s economically and public relations-ly wise to shoot for those invites, but at what cost?

Even further, the six-win rule caters perfectly to this bizarre (though perhaps necessary) losing paranoia among football coaches and their bosses.

News flash: Teams lose. You can’t hide from it. And if you try, you’re in the wrong business.

The college football people really ought to get together with their bowl people friends and do the right thing — the thing that’s best for game, not the business of the game.

Ax the rule.