So by now seemingly every sports journalist has decided which football team should ACTUALLY be college football champion. And the national championship game hasn't even happened yet.
Before the bowls started, the talk was how Texas got screwed out of the national championship game. The logic made sense: Oklahoma was in the national championship game. Texas had beaten Oklahoma head to head and had the same record. Therefore, Texas should be in the championship game. (Texas Tech only had one loss too, but the Red Raiders once again had a Glass Joe non-conference schedule, so they were left out of the discussion).
After Texas struggled to beat Ohio State in the Fiesta Bowl, however, the Longhorns are no longer the team that got screwed. Forget that they drove the length of the field in the final two minutes to win, or that Colt McCoy threw for 414 yards against a senior-laden Ohio State team desperate for redemption in bowl games. The Longhorns didn't destroy the Buckeyes and therefore didn't deserve a championship.
Now it seems people fall into one of two camps:
The first says that USC is the team that got screwed. They destroyed Penn State in the Rose Bowl (wow, who saw that coming) and looked unstoppable.
The second says that Utah got screwed because they are the only undefeated team and they blasted an Alabama team that was number one for several weeks.
Sigh.
Okay. First of all, I agree that all three of these teams have an argument- for and against.
USC looked unstoppable, but they lost to an Oregon State team that was man-handled by Penn State earlier this year.
Utah is undefeated and beat Oregon, BYU, and Alabama. They also played Weber State, Wyoming, and San Diego State. Utah barely beat TCU 13-10 while Oklahoma beat that same Horned Frog team by 25 points. Utah beat a crappy New Mexico team 13-10. You think that score would hold in the Big 12 or SEC? I know it's flawed logic, just like the BCS. But we all know that many college football upsets happen because of the weekly grind that forces teams to win without playing their best every week. You play poorly against New Mexico, you can still pull out a win. You play poorly against Missouri or Mississippi, and you get knocked out of the title chase.
Texas played a tough schedule and looked prime for a spot in the national championship game, but a dropped INT against Tech sealed their fate. If you don't like the system, you can't give it a chance to not work. If Texas wins that game, there is no argument about whether they belong in Miami.
Before they lost to the Utes, even Alabama had a legit gripe about being excluded from the national championship picture. This is a team that went into Georgia and won big, held on to the number 1 ranking until the end of the season and then lost to Florida in the SEC championship game. If it were the Pac 10 or Big 10 (no conference championship), Alambama goes to the title game. But they didn't. And then lost to Utah. Oh well.
The point of this is that there isn't an answer in the current system. So just enjoy debating the merits of your team. Do you think Auburn fans have forgotten about 2004 when they were undefeated and yet passed over for the title game? The debate didn't rage afterwards because everyone just assumed USC would beat anyone since they bent Oklahoma over for a prostate exam 55-19. I bet Auburn would have loved a shot at USC though. And Auburn fans will be happy to tell you all about it while they spend the next decade watching Alabama dominate them.
So if you're a Longhorns fan, a Utes fan, a Trojan fan, or just someone who likes to argue stuff, remember: Just because someone is voted national champion, doesn't mean you have to recognize it. Argue away my friends.
And maybe watch the national championship game too.
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