The BCS, or Bowl Championship Series, is once again under heavy fire from fans, sportswriters and players. A few years back it was decided that a computer system, dubbed the BCS, would rank the top 25 college football teams in the nation based on several factors such as strength or schedule, record, and point differentials. In midseason the BCS was being criticized, but not to the extent as it is now. Nebraska was ranked number one and had an undefeated record. The fate of the BCS turned sour when Colorado smoked Nebraska 62-36 in late November, instilling doubt in the minds of Nebraska fans and college football fans alike.
The mayhem continued into December when Brigham Young University filed a lawsuit against the BCS for denial of a bowl berth. BYU had climbed up to the 13th spot with an undefeated record. A bowl was not awarded due to the fact that their schedule was devoid of top 10 football teams. The BCS’ rank of 13 proved to be absolutely inaccurate as during the next week June Jones’ Rainbow Warriors of Hawaii scored over 70 points on BYU to shut them up and thankfully drop them out of the elite.
When the season was winding down many teams were bickering about how they should have a spot in the Rose Bowl, this year’s site for the National Championship. The Texas Longhorns had a valid claim late after bombing Kansas, Baylor, and Texas A & M but fell short in a loss to the Colorado Buffaloes. Colorado was in a situation where they had defeated two top-five teams in consecutive weeks and were primed for a Rose Bowl berth but were denied in favor of a team they had just beaten a few weeks earlier. The dark horse in the race for the two seed was Oregon, who has defeated #15 Washington State and #16 UCLA in the final four weeks of the season but was only rewarded a berth in the Fiesta Bowl versus Colorado, a battle of disgruntled high seeds.
Colorado and Oregon, battling in the Fiesta Bowl, seemed to be teams of similar stature and would play a close game to find out who would be considered the final number two seed. But Colorado’s dreams of proving themselves worthy of the Rose Bowl were dashed by the Ducks in a 38-16 rout. These Buffaloes were carved into wings and fingers by Joey Harrington and got knocked down to the number nine spot in the final poll.
The biggest bomb dropped on the BCS occurred in the national championship game, when the Cornhuskers were swept away by Miami’s Hurricanes in an old fashioned blowout 37-14. Ken Dorsey led Miami to a 34-0 lead in the first half before Nebraska could blink and set up another well-expected dud for a Rose Bowl. The only team that could have weathered the Hurricanes was the versatile Oregon Ducks, but the evil BCS computed that Nebraska should play.
I guess we have no faith in our beloved Associated Press and are now letting computers decide what is best. The outcome of relying on the BCS computer were two blowouts by Oregon and Nebraska, another unmentioned Maryland Terrapin thrashing by the Gators 56-23, and one “close” victory by the LSU Tigers over Illinois. These awful bowl games, set up by the BCS, forced me to satiate my college football desire by watching the GMAC Bowl, galleryfurniture.com Bowl, and the Chick-Fil-A Peach Bowl. Maybe next year I will just forgo watching the big games like the Sugar Bowl and Rose Bowl and see if I can score tickets to the Trojan Extra Sensitive Bowl.
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