I won’t spend much time ranting about what a joke the Bowl Championship Series is, since the vast majority of fans would prefer a playoff and one won’t be coming for years. So we are left with another “championship” game that will not satisfy a large percentage of fans. If predictions hold, Florida and Oklahoma will play in the Orange Bowl Jan. 8 for the BCS title.
Florida, behind superstud Tim Tebow (photo), beat Alabama, 31-20, to win the SEC title, while Oklahoma crushed Missouri, 62-21, to win the Big XII. It was very low-class for the Sooners to be throwing deep with starting QB Sam Bradford still in the game with a 34-point lead and four minutes left in an attempt to set a scoring record. Bradford then sounded like a sore winner with his garbage “we got no respect” post-game comments on ABC; I’ll be pulling for the Gators. With both Florida and Oklahoma having one regular-season loss, we have yet another unsatisfying end to the college football season.
Think Texas fans will recognize OU as champs if the Sooners beat Florida? Forget it, since Texas beat OU by 10 on a neutral field. And will someone please explain why Florida’s home loss to Mississippi is somehow “better” than USC’s sole loss at Oregon State or Penn State’s last-play loss at Iowa? And don’t forget unbeaten Utah and Boise State, who are totally left out of the conversation.
If you were the czar of college football and had to make the choice, what two teams would you pick to play in the BCS final? I would take Texas vs. USC. The Longhorns are a dropped interception away (at Texas Tech) from being unbeaten (I assume they would have beaten Missouri on Saturday), while USC has the best defense in college football and played one bad quarter this season. I would love to see what others think, and why — our matchups would be no less legit than what the BCS spews out.
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 6:09 am
First off, Boise and Utah have no business even being considered … strength of schedule.
Obviously you have Florida in the BCS … the game against Mississippi was a fluke … everyone knows that 99 times out of 100 Florida wins that game. Plus after that game they have come back with a vengeance …
As for their opponent? I’d say USC .. another fluke loss early in the season.
Penn State - lost to Iowa late in the year.
Texas doesn’t deserve it after losing to Texas Tech, and neither does OU.
BUT - let’s get real - how else are you going to satisfy everyone’s desire for a “true” national champion? In a college sport where hundreds of teams play only 13 games a season, its impossible. The BCS, while imperfect, represents the best compromise. So let’s all stop whining, drink our beer, and watch some football.
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 8:18 am
Ole Miss beating Florida was not a fluke. They were the team most prepared. You must be a Gator.
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 8:43 am
“Think Texas fans will recognize OU as champs if the Sooners beat Florida?”
Do you really think the Sooner nation will care? the media is the one perpertuating this drumbeat… for every ‘45-35′ one can easily say ‘39-33′…
“It was very low-class for the Sooners to be throwing deep with starting QB Sam Bradford still in the game with a 34-point lead and four minutes left in an attempt to set a scoring record.”
Was it ‘low-class’ for Army’s running back to be in the game trying to set a team single season rushing record with 30 seconds left in Philadelphia? The answer of course is ‘”no” and teh same applies here. Last time I checked the game is 60 minutes long… either play defense or be quiet…
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 8:45 am
Ole Miss beat a ranked LSU, Florida, and lost by 4 points to Bama. Oregon St played three other ranked teams besides USC and got crushed by more than 25 points twice and barely lost to Utah (which I don’t care what you say, is overrated and will be crushed in its BCS bowl like Hawaii last year). Ole Miss and Oregon St have identical records. Yes, people in California lose if USC doesn’t make it…but that is about it. Yes, I’m from Florida and your from California, so what?
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 8:55 am
Not sure there are any decent arguments out there that USC deserves a title game trip over Florida.
Providing a comparison of their single losses hardly counts as sufficient backup, when its only one game of 12 on the schedule.
What’s so great about Oregon St anyway? Didn’t they get drilled just last week?
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 9:16 am
And all of this is why the present system sucks. There IS a better way, and it’s an 8-team tournament, making the regular season 11 games again and using seven bowl games as the tournament. You can still end Jan. 8 and everyone’s happy.
The best-possible game: Oklahoma vs. USC. The best offense vs. the best defense.
Instead, some poll will tell us who the national champion is. It’s why I have virtually stopped watching college football.
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 10:34 am
Cyd,Cyd,Cyd you must be out west,the SEC defence’s are much better than any one,and I say if Florida is in with 1 loss,hell let bama in with 1 loss. They did loss to a good team(not ole miss)
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 10:39 am
“o you really think the Sooner nation will care? the media is the one perpertuating this drumbeat… for every ‘45-35′ one can easily say ‘39-33′…”
You can really think to compare 45-35 on a neutral field to 39-33? Give me a break. Yes, they are both a win for one team and a loss for the other but factor in the other aspects and the differences are greater than that single mathematical similarity. The Texas-Tech game started bad for Texas who came back strongly in the second half and lost in the final seconds. Those seconds will haunt Texas for years. Had they exhibited better clock management this entire argument (yea, the arguments all of you make) would be mute and we’d be talking about who’s the better team between Texas and Florida. Any question about that, go back and watch the replay of the last few minutes of that game.
I partially agree with Cyd (and probably a lot of you) that a playoff system might work. The challenge will be how we get those 8 teams. That’s the nice thing about the basketball and baseball tournaments in the NCAA. They can admit a heck of a lot more teams so there really is no argument about who ended up as the champion. An 8 team playoff in football is somewhat good but is also bad by that aspect. There will always be questions.
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 10:48 am
Nice article……..i agree. The BCS stinks and Oklahoma has no class. I personally think that Texas and USC are the two best teams in America….
And to Sooner Nation…..Even if you win the Nationl Title you know you weren’t better than Texas in 2008…that was proven on the field this year! Way to go scoring over 60 points in 5 straight games to overcompensate for your defeat in Dallas……real classy guys!
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 11:16 am
I’m sick of hearing this constant whinning out of Texas fans. Each team had the oppurtunity to run the table and didn’t thats why there is an issue. You win your games our you leave your fate up to the fical fate of chance. All those who believe an eight game playoff is enough are idiots how do you pick the eight teams? By polls? Then you still have the same issue of good teams getting snubbed. The problem is that divisio one football has to many teams and to many ways of doing things. There are 11 conferances doing things slightly differently and rarely mixing it up amongst each other not to mention four teams that aren’t even in a conference. Until there is standardization between the conferances and all teams play in a conferance you will always have a crap shoot as to the national champion even with a mediocre 8 game playoff. The only titles you can more or less count on is the conferance championships this year being a 3 way ti in the Big 12.(any one of the co south champs would have smoked Missouri). After that its just guese work.
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 12:57 pm
Some may be whining but personally I’m just trying to set the record straight that the 45-35 win is more significant over OU than the Tech 39-33 win over Texas. OU fans might try to think otherwise but it’s pretty clear in my mind. Personally I’m more at fault with the Big 12’s method of selection for the division leader than anything. So, to your point, we won our game which had we been using a more reasonable approach that many other conferences used we would be in a different situation. Therefore I agree, we win our game which we did over OU.
To the point of the BCS selection I completely agree with you on the inconsistency of the conferences in their championships. The point you bring up about selecting the 8 team playoff is also something I agree. We have a difficult situation in college football that many thing you can just wave a wand and declare playoff and your done. If it were only that simple. We could run an entire discussion thread on this (which there probably is in the discussion boards now).
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 1:16 pm
Dave Farber,
How can you say Utah shouldn’t be considered on strength of schedule and then say USC should? The Mountain West crushed the Pac 10 this year (6-1). How can you say TCU doesn’t stack up against Oregon and BYU isn’t as good as Oregon State? Even at the end of the spectrum the Pac 10 has Washington and Washington State. Real power houses right?
No business being considered? It is that same mentality that is ruining college football.
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 2:57 pm
Well I’d have to take Boise State, Utah, Florida, Alabama, USC, and Penn State out of the equation due to their weak schedules. That leaves Texas, Texas Tech, and Oklahoma. I feel like Texas and Oklahoma were the most impressive throughout the season and the fact that Texas almost accomplished something unprecedented (beating 4 straight top 12 teams) and Okahoma did (6 straight 60 pt. games) is pretty remarkable. Definitely Texas vs. Oklahoma.
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 3:47 pm
Scooter, I live in New York and grew up on the East Coast.
I don’t have a horse in this race. I couldn’t care less who wins this bullshit national championship.
It’s crazy to hear people say how a playoff “might” work. Every other major sports league in the world has a playoff. My system is simple: Invite every undefeated team and then round out the lot with the BCS rankings (and use the BCS rankings to seed teams).
The argument will be that you’re encouraging teams to create easy schedules. But, the present system does that, so nothing changes.
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 5:49 pm
The writer of this article is clueless. Every fan poll shows that most people want to see oklahoma vs. florida. Personally, I’d rather see texas go than oklahoma, but the arguement for ok is stronger. Is this guy even a sports writer?
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 7:21 pm
“Every fan poll shows that most people want to see oklahoma vs. florida.”
So that’s your criteria — an unscientific fan poll? Give me a break. I’m a fan and that’s not the game I want to see.
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 9:20 pm
Why does everyone assume that SEC defenses are superior. Isn’t it rather the case that no-one really knows which conference has the best offenses and defenses until the representatives play each other in the deciding bowl games. For example, when Florida beat Ohio State in 2006, wasn’t that considered a surprise to most? Nevertheless, does that result mean that SEC teams are always better than big ten schools? No. Florida lost to Michigan in its 2007 bowl game. I think we just have to watch the games to find out who’s better at the end.
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 9:24 pm
If the Texas/Oklahoma game had been played later in the season Texas would have had 2 losses instead of one. They were lucky to have won as many games as they did. They have been whining about Oklahoma going to the Big 12 Championship game, well they need to get over it and STOP BEING SUCH LOSERS and yeah I’m from Oklahoma. GO SOONERS!!!!!Boomer Sooner
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 10:07 pm
get over it ut.mack brown got on tv 2004 and cry about his team should go to the rose bowl to play usc.because cal took a knee in the last play win over so.miss. what goes around comes around.ut need to go a beat the hell out of overrated ohio state go sec.sam bradford will be runing for his life.florida D WILL WIN THIS GAME.ou will turn the ball over 3 times.gator by 17.
on Dec 7th, 2008 at 10:11 pm
Florida should play in the National Championship game because they beat undefeated #1 Alabama in the last weekend of the season. Did USC beat the # 1 team ever, much less at the end of the season??? What a ridiculous and biased argument. Oklahoma or Texas–That is debatable. Florida beating undefeated #1 team is not debatable. Florida should be ranked #1 in ALL polls on Dec. 7, not just most of them.
on Dec 8th, 2008 at 12:48 am
This sports writer always has the same complaint about teams running up the score, starters staying in the game etc….
Turn the page already, your as bad as those still whining about the 2000 presidential election.
I’d rather see Oklahoma play Texas again and then the winner play Florida. About them playing on a neutral field, the last time I checked Dallas is still in Texas. Send them to Montana if you want neutral.
on Dec 8th, 2008 at 10:32 am
The disgrace of the current system is that the only team that truly deserves to be in the national championship game won’t be there. Texas’ only loss was on the road to a team ranked #2 at the time on a last second score (and no, I’m not a Texas fan). Plus they beat the current #1 team, Oklahoma.
Be careful what you wish for . . A four or eight team playoff tournament would probably be ideal. Anything larger than that and you risk creating a system similar to college basketball, pro football, pro basketball, etc. Namely a virtually meaningless regular season. College football currently has the worst post season, but the BEST regular season of any major sport (pro or college). EVERY game matters. You can’t say that about any other sport. In college football, a loss to a poor team in Sept or October could possibly cost a team a shot at the national championship.
on Dec 8th, 2008 at 10:36 am
In my previous post (#22) the last line should say, ” . . any loss at any time to any team on its schedule could possibly cost a team a shot at the national championship”
on Dec 8th, 2008 at 12:37 pm
you must win your conf. title game 12 and 1 is alot better than11 and 1 the big ten needs to have a conf. title game and the pack 10 needs too.until this happens the big 10 and the pac 10 will be runners up to the sec and big 12 teams this have been so the last 3 nat. title games.this is why the big10 and pac 10 look so weak .and how about playing someone out of conf.usc dose but not enough.nat.title game has the right two teams in this game.penn st. usc. tx al fans suck it up and go play your bowl game.and why in the hell is ohio st doing in a bcs bowl.they are the most overraye college football teams of all times!!!! they are chock artists when they play the best teams from the sec big12 and pas10. app.st would give them a hard time.
on Dec 8th, 2008 at 12:50 pm
Obviously “sooners showed no class for throwing deep at end of game” is a ridiculous statement. Bob Stoops never campaigned every sports show like Mack Brown did.
In a championship game, does anyone take their starters out?
No one in the big 12 thinks our tie breaker is right, but the fans can’t change it, only the conference officials. Oklahoma tried to win the game, and did.
I would prefer OU VS Texas in the Fiesta Bowl. You can give the National Championship to someone else. We just want to beat Texas so Mack Brown will shut up.
on Dec 8th, 2008 at 1:48 pm
It’s great to be a Florida Gator!
on Dec 8th, 2008 at 5:39 pm
Jim,
While I can agree with you that a playoff is preferable to this BCS mess, I have to disagree with your wanting to put USC in the title game. For all the talent they’ve stockpiled, USC underperformed all year in a relatively weak Pac-10.
You think USC only played one bad quarter all season? I’m assuming you mean the quarter where the Trojans were outgained 149-9 and outscored 10-3, during which that vaunted defense was back on its collectively heels against its unranked opponent? Because that pretty accurately describes the first quarter against Stanford this November. And the second quarter was close to a draw yardage-wise and the teams went in tied 17-17 at the half. That’s at least 2 “bad” quarters that I can think of — and I’m assuming you were referring to the first quarter in their loss in Corvallis.
It’s hard to argue with Oklahoma and Florida. The problem this season is that it’s also hard to argue against Texas. And someone’s got to be on the outside looking in under this system.
on Dec 8th, 2008 at 9:35 pm
Joe the way you get Mack Brown to shut up is to actually BEAT Texas, which OU didn’t in Dallas. All I’ve seen from Sooner fans is how they want a later match to try to prove they are a better team. Ludicrous and lame arguments. I personally would like to see a Texas-OU rematch but the BCS system prevented that. However I don’t think claims that another game will settle the score. Texas will match up again in Dallas next year with both Bradford and McCoy at the helms. It will be interesting to see what happens then. Of course based on Sooner comments in here even if Texas wins that it still won’t settle the score.
BTW, the only reason I can see OU ran the score up so badly and keep Bradford in was to improve his chances for the Heisman. Apparently that didn’t seem to work since McCoy now leads Heisman polls as of today.
on Dec 9th, 2008 at 1:24 am
OU’s offense vs. USC’s defense is the match-up most purists want to see. OU’s defense is improving and should be able to hold Florida enough times for OU’s offense to win the game.
on Dec 13th, 2008 at 11:27 pm
Look who got the Heisman. Look who’s going to the Championship. Even the commentators at the end of the OU/TX game said it correctly when they said ‘the better team didn’t win today, just the team with fewer mistakes.’
OU was robbed an interception in the endzone, plus Texas was allowed 10 points in the first half due to 3rd down conversions based on bogus Oklahoma penalties that shouldn’t have happened. Texas had some of the best acting that game. “Oh god he touched me too hard!” Texas fans need to suck it up and realize that they weren’t as good as they thought they were.
As for Bradford throwing long in the final seconds of the OU/Mizzou game…. Cry me a river, Stoops is one of the classiest coaches in college football. He says all the time how they don’t care what the press and people think. As long as they do their job and win games, then that’s the best they can do. He hates politiking.
Mack Brown is just throwing a pity party and has invited everyone.
on Dec 14th, 2008 at 2:34 am
“Even the commentators at the end of the OU/TX game said it correctly when they said ‘the better team didn’t win today, just the team with fewer mistakes.’”
What amazing spin. OU fans I have spoken with or seen on the Net are twisting themselves in knots to convince themselves that they really didn’t lose to Texas … by double digits … on a neutral field. Just admit your team benefited from a lousy system and I can buy it, but don’t insult our intelligence.
And Stoops was running it up and showed zero class vs. Mizzou. Hope Stoops loses as badly to Florida as he did to USC, or chokes as badly as he did vs. Boise State.
on Dec 16th, 2008 at 6:41 pm
Dude: Your article is about the most ignorant sports article that I have ever read. Yes, Texas beat Oklahoma (#1 lost to #5). Texas also lost to Texas Tech (again a # 1 ranked team lost to another top 5 team). Florida and USC both lost to UNRANKED teams. So STFU! Clearly OU and Texas are the top 2 teams in the country and deserve a rematch to settle this outright. As for OU running up the score, OU probably felt that it needed to make a statement to impress the BCS to ensure it’s chances of making the title game you moron.
on Jan 1st, 2009 at 1:17 pm
what does classsy have to do with anything this is football if you don’t like what is happening get better how does a texan know anything about class anyway
on Jan 6th, 2009 at 10:26 pm
#3 UT’s last minute win over #10 OSU in the Fiesta Bowl was less than impressive. I am glad Texas won (I’m a Big 12 fan!), but man, did you have to show so much class doing it?
Boomer Sooner!!!
on Jan 7th, 2009 at 4:09 pm
The Gators are most deffinelty going to win the National Championship, & I’m SO excited. It won’t be a blow out, it will be a very close game. That’s my prediction. I’m a big Gator fan, & The Gators have won 2 out of 3 BCS National Championships in the past 3 years with Urban Meyer. & Remember, We didn’t have Percy Harvin against ‘Bama and we STILL beat them. Percy is in rehab for his ankle and is back to full health for the game.
So Oklahomo better watch out.