So here’s how it would look twenty years ago, before even the Bowl Alliance was a gleam in someone’s eye, and the Big East was a basketball league:<\/p>\n
ROSE: Oregon vs Wisconsin. 1 versus 4, and a real banging matchup natch.<\/p>\n
SUGAR: Auburn vs TCU. 2 vs 3, setting up nicely for the winner to be national champion if Oregon falls.<\/p>\n
ORANGE: Virginia Tech vs Oklahoma, which should work out nicely for the Hokies.<\/p>\n
COTTON: Arkansas vs Stanford, which ought to be an offensive barnburner.<\/p>\n
FIESTA: Boise State vs, I don’t know, Ohio State or somebody, who cares.<\/p>\n
NOWHERE CLOSE TO JANUARY 1: Connecticut, which at 8-4 shouldn’t be anywhere better than the Poulan Weed-Eater Independence Bowl.<\/p>\n
What have we learned, kids?<\/p>\n
1) The BCS doesn’t make anything better, and has a way of screwing good teams while helping out those that don’t deserve it.<\/p>\n
2) Conference champions don’t deserve automatic berths in BCS bowls just by virtue of being a conference champion.<\/p>\n
3) The Big East, by virtue of adding TCU, may now be the equal of the new-look Mountain West (Boise, Nevada, Fresno State, Air Force, and San Diego State all have at least the same record as Connecticut).<\/p>\n
4) The WAC is no longer of any concern for BCS purposes, seeing as how it’s filling out its gaps with teams that are still in I-AA this year.<\/p>\n
5) This is the weakest season in years for the Pac-10 (which couldn’t fill its bowl allotment) and the SEC (which was supremely lopsided) – and yet their champions, probably for just that reason, are the two undefeateds meeting for the title…<\/p>\n
6) …on January 10. There are bowls now scattered over a span of almost three weeks. This is ridiculous.<\/p>\n
7) New rule: now that there are 12 regular season games, you should have to post 7 wins to be eligible for a bowl. Any bowl left without teams shouldn’t be played anyway. A bowl is not a participation trophy.<\/p>\n
8) Once again, look me in the eye and tell me that what we have now is better than how it was 20 years ago.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
So here’s how it would look twenty years ago, before even the Bowl Alliance was a gleam in someone’s eye, and the Big East was a basketball league: ROSE: Oregon vs Wisconsin. 1 versus 4, and a real banging matchup natch. SUGAR: Auburn vs TCU. 2 vs 3, setting up nicely for the winner to … <\/p>\n