It’s that time again! Let’s analyze the Bowl Championship Series. Afterwards, we’ll discover a plethora of controversial decisions made by the BCS Committee, ones that are evident every year since the inception of the system in 1998.
I’m sure there are underlying factors this year of why the Bowl Championship Series system should be altered, but the big one is possibly the biggest, most controversial occurrence in the history of the BCS had to do with the omission of the current #4 team in the country, The California Golden Bears.
The Bears finished the season with a record of 10-1, including a win over 24th ranked Arizona State, and a close loss to the #1 team and defending national champions, the USC Trojans. By the way, the Trojans will be playing for their second straight national championship on January 4th when they face off against Oklahoma in the FedEx Orange Bowl.
Oh, by the way, Cal also ranked 28th in strength of schedule (out of 117 teams in Division 1-A) in 2004.
I’m sure that even in this newspaper, writers have voiced their dissatisfaction with the BCS for multiple reasons. The ones I have are as follows.
Topped off by this year’s snubbing of Cal, the selection committee has made this mistake in the past.
Despite what was thought to be a new, flawless system in 1998, there have been even more controversies in the years following. Also, the idea of co-national champions has not been eliminated as was the case last year when LSU won the Nokia Sugar Bowl, last year’s national championship game, and USC was still the co-champ.
This year’s episode tops a long list of corrupt practices in the encouragable art of placing college football teams in the right bowl, or leaving certain teams out by making what they think at the time is the right choice. This year’s example of this was Texas Head Coach Mack Brown urging other coaches and the always-straightforward news media (obvious sarcasm) to vote the Longhorns above Cal in the final BCS standings. Obviously the lobbying worked.
The first participants in the Bowl Championship Series were announced at this point in 1998, I have been lobbying (if that’s what you want to call it) for a playoff system that would have anywhere from 16 to 24 teams. This system would include all conference champions in Division 1-A (12). The other four to 12 teams would be at-large selections picked by the sportswriters, ones that are screened and have no affiliations morally or financially with any team or conference in the NCAA.
While I can’t exactly guarantee that the new system, if or when it is implemented, will be exactly like stated above, hopefully it is close. I have come to the conclusion that there is no way to actually determine the outright national champion. A playoff system is the closest thing to it. My advice to the NCAA is to stop searching for perfection, and settle with something that involves a much smaller risk of collusion and bad, actually piss-poor decision making. And when the problem is finally solved, the world will at last be safe for democracy.
