BCS Bllsht, redux
Well, the NCAA bowl season is, mercifully, over. Florida spanked Ohio State, and has emerged as the “National Champion”. So the BCS system must’ve worked, right? Right?
Nope.
I really don’t think that Florida has proven themselves to be the undeniable “best” team of the past 5 months. Perhaps the team that best negotiated the rocky shoals of the mandated 4-to-7 week break between the regular season and the bowl season.
To better illustrate my thoughts on this whole thing, let me copy here what I wrote as a comment over at Hoc est Verum:
I view it as more of a result of the whole mixed-up wasteland that is post-season college football.
Traditionally, i.e., roughly up until the 70’s bowls were never meant as definitive capstone statements about the whole of the regular season. Rather, they were “rewards” that really didn’t bear much impact on what had been borne out over the regular season. IOW, the bowls didn’t pretend to be arbiters of “the best”.
Thus, the horrific 5+ week break between the end of the regular season and Jan 1 wasn’t all that big a deal. Sure, play may have gotten sloppier as a result of game-tested focus being lost during practices & the holidays, but since the bowls were just glorified exhibitions, it didn’t really matter.
Since the late 70’s however, the bowls have taken on an ever-increasing patina of “final-word” type legitimacy, at least in terms of crowning a “champion”. The BCS has only exacerbated this misguided tendency. Why misguided? Well because the cronyistic bowl cabals were never jettisoned in order to actually give the NCAA postseason the legitimacy that exists at every other level in NCAA competition.
They (the bowl poobahs and University Presidents) have tried to have their cake & eat it too. And they’ve failed miserably.
All of this is just preface to my comment about last night’s game:
Ohio State was clearly the best team in the country through the whole regular season. And if the game against Florida had been played within a week or two of 11/18, then I think OSU would’ve rolled over Florida. Instead of that, however, OSU got waylaid by the SEVEN WEEK break they were forced to endure.
There has got to be a better way. Actually, there is, it’s just that the morons in charge are too greedy (and/or stupid) to do it.
In the end, I don’t know who is really the best; however, I’d sure like to see anyone try to beat Boise State — being the only undefeated Div I team has got to mean something more than just getting a #5 ranking in the final poll…
-ghp
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