It's long been established that the Bowl Championship Series is not a perfect system. Every year, we seem to have an argument about who should be in the bowls and what to do with teams like Boise State that play a vastly inferior schedule yet find themselves with superb records at the end of the season. This year is no exception.
There are legitimate complaints about the majority of the teams playing in the BCS. I haven't heard anything about the Rose Bowl or Fiesta Bowl, since all four of those teams seem to deserve a place in the BCS.
The championship game is riddled with controversy. LSU already beat Alabama in Tuscaloosa this year. A lot of people wanted to see Oklahoma State in the Championship game. It would have been an interesting contest, but more importantly, it would have been new. The rematch just opens up the conversation for more controversy in the future. What's worse is that the USA Today Coaches Poll voting was released today. We can see that not only did coaches have Oklahoma State below Alabama, but also some had them below Stanford as well. I won't rehash the Oklahoma State versus Alabama debate because that's all over the internet. I will say that Oklahoma State versus Stanford should be a little more clear. Oklahoma State played 7 bowl bound teams, defeating 6. Stanford, including USC who is bowl banned, beat 6 bowl bound teams, defeating 5. The Big XII is a much harder conference than the Pac 12 to boot. I guess we'll see which team is better in the Fiesta Bowl anyway.
The Sugar Bowl has also taken a lot of heat. I believe Michigan deserves to be there. They finished 10-2 with a schedule that featured 10 bowl bound opponents. I also feel that the Big Ten Conference as a whole has not received the positive public perception that it should. There were 5 teams from the Big Ten that finished in the top 25. Not enough people are pointing this out. A lot of the complaints are coming from Michigan State because they won the Legends Division and played in the Big Ten Conference Game. Well, Michigan State had a chance to go out and defeat Wisconsin for the right to play in a better bowl. They did not. It's an imperfect system, but I don't think you can complain about Michigan going to the BCS bowl. Michigan's ranking makes them look worse than they are, but as long as the Big Ten had teams with a good enough record, they were going to get a second BCS bid. Michigan had a good enough record as well as other tangible qualities (see ticket sales).
I believe there are legitimate gripes about Virginia Tech. The ACC is not a strong conference. VT had a chance to show that their only loss was an anomaly, and they were stomped again. Their schedule itself was extremely weak. They faced 6 teams that were bowl eligible including Miami, who is passing on a bowl and the two games against Clemson, and won 4 of them. There were a lot of conference runner ups that had the same record, but with tougher schedules. You could look at a Kansas State, Baylor, or TCU here. It's unfortunate, but what can you do? It's more an exhibition game than a serious competition. It's the money that's the difference. These two teams sell.
The Orange Bowl is kind of a joke. With how bad the Big East teams did this year, they really don't deserve a team in the BCS. Additionally, none of those teams are really competitive with the other major conferences. They're taking a spot from a more deserving team like a Kansas State, Boise State, Baylor, or TCU. West Virginia does not belong. Clemson suffered in the latter part of their year partially because of injury, but they won their conference championship to get in. The Big East didn't even have one of those. I think the system is going to change soon. As far as undeserving schools, West Virginia is at the top of the list, not Michigan, not Virginia Tech, not Clemson.
I really haven't had a good look at the rest of the bowls, but one of the bigger stories should be the fall of Penn State. Rather than playing Oklahoma in the Insight Bowl, Penn State dropped all the way down to facing Houston in the Ticket City Bowl. Clearly, the whole scandal has made them untouchable. This reflects poorly on the Big Ten Conference because Oklahoma should beat Iowa handily, denying the Conference a chance to prove its worth.
I don't have any other thoughts at the moment. It looks like I will be heading to the Sugar Bowl barring any changes. I still have to make travel arrangements, but I bought my ticket to the game. I'll talk more about that when the time comes. The other post I really want to make this week is to talk about the Heisman race. A lot of people are keying in on certain players, but I'm sort of leaning a different way. I'd like to talk more about that.
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