Wednesday, October 22, 2008
What to Cheer For
Now that my BYU Cougars have been beaten by what was, at least last Thursday night, a superior TCU team, the principal aim I've been hoping for in the college football world - a BYU berth in a BCS game - seems nearly impossible. The far-fetched idea of BYU playing for the national championship is truly impossible. So what's a Cougar-loving, BCS-hating football fan to do?
Fear not, I've come up with three things I'd love to see happen over the course of the second half of the college football season, each of which is certainly possible. The cards just have to shake out right.
1. Oklahoma State in the National Championship Game. The thing about college football is that not only does it discriminate against teams that aren't from one of the cartel conferences, but it also has a strong disfavor toward even cartel-conference teams that aren't one of the traditional powers (i.e. Ohio State, USC, Texas, Oklahoma, LSU, Florida...). A team like Oklahoma State, which has always been a middle-of-the-road team, always get the championship shaft. But OSU is undefeated and looking pretty good. If they keep playing as well as they have been, they could wind up in the national championship game, and a barrier will be broken similar to the one broken when Utah went to the Fiesta Bowl in 2004.
2. TCU in a BCS Game. TCU has a chance to break yet another barrier: they can be the first one-loss BCS-buster. Their only loss of the season was on the road to then-de-facto-#1 Oklahoma. TCU has already knocked off #9 BYU, and in two weeks Utah should be in the top 10 and TCU will beat them too. If they were in the SEC or Pac-10 or probably even the Big East, a resume like that would get TCU into the championship game. Coming from the Mountain West, it should at least get them into a BCS game. Then we will never have to say that a non-cartel-conference team has to go undefeated to get into a decent bowl game.
3. Two BCS Busters. TCU should not have to be alone. The way things are shaping up, it's not unlikely that there could actually be two non-cartel-conference teams in BCS games. Only one such team can be guaranteed an automatic berth; other non-cartel-conference teams can qualify for and be selected for a BCS game just like any cartel-conference non-champion. But to get in, a BCS bowl would have to voluntarily select them over an eligible cartel-conference team. Unless there aren't enough eligible cartel-conference teams.
BCS rules state that no one conference can have more than two teams in a BCS game. They also state that to be eligible for an at-large berth, a team must be ranked #14 or higher in the final BCS standings. This year, the Big 12 and the SEC have lots of highly-ranked teams, and that can work in favor of the BCS busters. All we need is for no other cartel conference to have a second team ranked in the top 14. And in the initial BCS standings that came out this week, the Big Ten is the only cartel conference that does. Therefore, we should all root hard against Ohio State for the rest of the season. Let Penn State do as well as they want, but do not let a second Big Ten team into the top 14. (There's no way the second-place Pac-10 team will be even close to ranked, let alone #14, and the ACC and Big East champions themselves will be lucky to be in the top 14, let alone the second-place team.) In this scenario, the ten teams in BCS games will be the six cartel conference champions, the second-place teams from the Big 12 and SEC, and two BCS busters - probably the Mountain West champion and Boise State, though if Boise loses a game, the second-place Mountain West team (BYU?) or maybe even Tulsa could make it to the top 14 and be eligible.
And that would be a wonderful thing.
Fear not, I've come up with three things I'd love to see happen over the course of the second half of the college football season, each of which is certainly possible. The cards just have to shake out right.
1. Oklahoma State in the National Championship Game. The thing about college football is that not only does it discriminate against teams that aren't from one of the cartel conferences, but it also has a strong disfavor toward even cartel-conference teams that aren't one of the traditional powers (i.e. Ohio State, USC, Texas, Oklahoma, LSU, Florida...). A team like Oklahoma State, which has always been a middle-of-the-road team, always get the championship shaft. But OSU is undefeated and looking pretty good. If they keep playing as well as they have been, they could wind up in the national championship game, and a barrier will be broken similar to the one broken when Utah went to the Fiesta Bowl in 2004.
2. TCU in a BCS Game. TCU has a chance to break yet another barrier: they can be the first one-loss BCS-buster. Their only loss of the season was on the road to then-de-facto-#1 Oklahoma. TCU has already knocked off #9 BYU, and in two weeks Utah should be in the top 10 and TCU will beat them too. If they were in the SEC or Pac-10 or probably even the Big East, a resume like that would get TCU into the championship game. Coming from the Mountain West, it should at least get them into a BCS game. Then we will never have to say that a non-cartel-conference team has to go undefeated to get into a decent bowl game.
3. Two BCS Busters. TCU should not have to be alone. The way things are shaping up, it's not unlikely that there could actually be two non-cartel-conference teams in BCS games. Only one such team can be guaranteed an automatic berth; other non-cartel-conference teams can qualify for and be selected for a BCS game just like any cartel-conference non-champion. But to get in, a BCS bowl would have to voluntarily select them over an eligible cartel-conference team. Unless there aren't enough eligible cartel-conference teams.
BCS rules state that no one conference can have more than two teams in a BCS game. They also state that to be eligible for an at-large berth, a team must be ranked #14 or higher in the final BCS standings. This year, the Big 12 and the SEC have lots of highly-ranked teams, and that can work in favor of the BCS busters. All we need is for no other cartel conference to have a second team ranked in the top 14. And in the initial BCS standings that came out this week, the Big Ten is the only cartel conference that does. Therefore, we should all root hard against Ohio State for the rest of the season. Let Penn State do as well as they want, but do not let a second Big Ten team into the top 14. (There's no way the second-place Pac-10 team will be even close to ranked, let alone #14, and the ACC and Big East champions themselves will be lucky to be in the top 14, let alone the second-place team.) In this scenario, the ten teams in BCS games will be the six cartel conference champions, the second-place teams from the Big 12 and SEC, and two BCS busters - probably the Mountain West champion and Boise State, though if Boise loses a game, the second-place Mountain West team (BYU?) or maybe even Tulsa could make it to the top 14 and be eligible.
And that would be a wonderful thing.
Comments: Post a Comment
