Continuing A Theme

Yes, I'm still talking college football, but that's because it's got a lot going on right now. Ohio State beat Michigan in the “Game of the Century”. They only won the game by three points, so now a lot of people are calling for a rematch in the BCS Championship. Which is crap. To begin with, Michigan was on an emotional after the death of their patron saint. Plus, it was a rivalry game where strange things happen. As the underdogs, Michigan played over their heads (this was their second highest scoring game), so a close game could be an aberration. It doesn't matter to me. I just don’t think any team should be playing in a one game national championship if they didn’t win their conference. The argument is that since Ohio State is clearly the number one team, then a close win means Michigan is clearly the number two team. Well, since Michigan was as close to losing to Ball State as beating Ohio State (Michigan scored their last time with two minutes, left and OSU ran out the clock while Ball State had the ball last with a chance to tie), does that mean Ball State is clearly the third best team in the Big 10 or is Michigan only the fifth best team in the MAC? The rematch argument might have a shot if the Big 10 was the best conference, but it wasn’t even close. Wisconsin is the only other Big 10 team in the top 25, and they got there by playing nobody (best non-conference opponent was 4-7 Bowling Green). Notre Dame lost to Michigan, but overall went 3-1 against the conference, and I’m not sold on the Irish. Hell, the Big East went 3-2 against the Big 10 with the only losses being Ohio State over Cincy and an Iowa win in overtime to Syracuse (worst team in the Big East). Outside of Ohio State’s win over Texas and Michigan’s over Notre Dame, what is the Big 10’s biggest out of conference win? Michigan State over a 6 win Pitt? Michigan over Vandy?

Unfortunately, Wisconsin has become the rule with the top teams from the big conferences. Don’t play anybody hard out of conference and defend it by saying your conference is so hard, you have to schedule patsies. It ignores the fact that Wisconsin has conference colleagues Illinois, Indiana and Northwestern every year. Much like the SEC talks about having a hard game every week, but ignores the fact that their conference includes Mississippi, Mississippi State, Vanderbilt, and most years, Kentucky. On a side note, I find the SEC defenders amusing when they talk about the great defenses in the SEC, but LSU was the only SEC school to put up more than 31 points against the Wildcats. Yet, Louisville, Central Michigan and Louisiana Monroe all scored 36 or more against UK.

I think Auburn last year was the epitome of the using the conference affiliation crutch. They started out the season losing to Georgia Tech, but went 7-1 in the SEC with the only loss being at LSU, so by the end of the season some were saying it was a shame Auburn’s loss kept them out of the SEC title game because they looked like the best team in the conference. Well, they lost 24-10 in their bowl game to Wisconsin meaning their only non-conference games against other BCS conference teams was two losses by double digits. If people had looked deeper, they may have noticed something. Auburn had lost to Georgia Tech pretty handily. In the SEC, five of the teams they beat (Ark, UK, S. Carolina, and the Miss schools) were mediocre at best, lousy at worst. So, they only had three hard games in conference. They lost to LSU, squeaked by Georgia and beat Alabama by 10. Simply put, they were a good team, but not anything special, so when they faced a comparable team from another conference, they lost.

This is really why I wish there was a college playoff. Teams would have more incentive to play tougher out of conference schedules, because a loss to a good team wouldn’t hurt as much as it does now. In football now, a second loss completely takes a team out of contention for the title. If Texas hadn’t scheduled Ohio State, they would be in consideration for the BCS championship because (assuming they replaced the Buckeyes with a cupcake) only have one loss since then. With a playoff, they would still have a shot because as winner of the Big 12, they would get in. Another reason is that this year, the assumption is made that Ohio State and Michigan are the top two teams, but since they haven’t played anybody from the PAC-10 or SEC, how do we know they aren’t where they are because the Big 10 is down? We don’t. In a playoff, they would have to face a top team from another conference. As much as I like going to bowl games, they are really a crap way to settle a championship.