BOWLING GREEN, Ky. — For the first time since becoming a full-fledged member of the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), the WKU football team hit the practice field in preparation for a bowl game on Wednesday. The practice was the first for WKU since accepting a bid to the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl on Sunday.

"I'm really excited to be playing football in December," WKU head coach Willie Taggart said. "It's the first time in a long time that WKU has been playing football in December."

With over a week gone by since being on the practice field, the Hilltoppers returned on Wednesday getting back to fundamentals, with kickoff against Central Michigan set for December 26 in Detroit, Mich.

"Right now we're really going to get back to the fundamentals of just playing football and tackling, lining up right and just playing technique football," Taggart said. "There are some things that you don't really get a chance to work on during the season, but we have a lot of time to work on it now to be ready for the game."

The first practice was especially enjoyable for the 19 WKU seniors, who will now have their final game in a Hilltopper uniform be in a bowl game.

"We're just excited," senior tight end Jack Doyle said. "You can feel the energy around here about going to this program's first bowl game as a Division I member. It's just an exciting time and excited to get it going."

The Hilltoppers will resume practice on Thursday. Below are quotes from Wednesday's first official bowl practice.

"No, not really to be honest with you. It will once we start to get going with practicing and that whole routine gets back. Last week there was a lot of down time and we kind of got bored. To get this routine back it definitely feels good."

'We watched a little bit in our positional meetings. They have a really good team and they have a lot of guys that can play. It's a great opportunity to really get to know them by having this much time, obviously. That is something we can't take for granted and say 'I'll do it tomorrow.' We have to do it now and use all of this time."

"No, this week off I was able to catch my legs. I feel refreshed and ready to go. I feel like it's week one."

"We looked at it. We have another good ball club. They have some good linebackers, d-line, safeties and I know they have a good d-coordinator. So we're going to have to come out here and do what we do."