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While almost all bowls are filled by contracts between the games and the conferences, the order within the conference that bowls use to select teams is not determined by merit. It’s determined by a mix of merit, TV appeal, travelability (new word?) of teams and ‘stories’, like a coach or player’s last game.
This doesn’t seem very fair. What would the bowl matchups look like if they were forced to take the best available team? How do you determine the best available team?
Selection Sunday kicks off at 8 p.m. EST Sunday. What would the bowls look like WASEAN were used to pick who goes where? WASEAN doesn’t care about how well teams travel. It would assume that each bowl selects the best available team it is allowed to take.
The SEC Championship was a bust, but the rest of Championship Weekend was one of the best couple of days of college football that I can remember.
The defacto Pac 10 championship game got the weekend off to a great start Thursday night as Oregon won a very entertaining 37-33 match-up in the 2009 edition of The Civil War. The #9 Ducks converted a couple of 4th downs late and is headed to Pasadena to take on #12 Ohio State New Year’s Day.
Saturday Cincinnati and Pitt got the day off to a great start with one of the most entertaining games of the season. The #7 Bearcats found themselves down 21 points with an undefeated season in jeopardy, but came from behind and won the game 45-44. The #14 Panthers missed a PAT after a mishandled snap with 1:36 to go gave them a 44-38 lead. Cincy finished unbeaten and will return to the BCS, most likely against Florida in the Sugar Bowl.
Boise State was not as impressive as expected in a 42-7 win over #115 New Mexico State. This caused this to slip behind Virginia Tech to #6. Tech’s opponents (Alabama & Georgia Tech) had a great weekend.
#2 Alabama got of a to a great start and never let Florida come up for air, leading start to finish in a 32-13 rout. Florida got the game within 12-10 in the 2nd quarter, but the Tide outscored them 20-3 the rest of the way. The Gators dropped from #1 to #4 with the loss.
Finally the night games . . . first the ACC. Georgia Tech blew a 33-20 lead as Clemson went up 34-33 with 6:11 remaining. But the #10 Yellow Jackets were able to put together a 13-play, 86-yard drive that consumed 4:45 to win the conference, spoiling CJ Spillers 20-carry, 233-yard, 4-TD performance.
In the Big 12 Championship, 14-point underdog Nebraska gave Texas everything they could handle. Despite managing just 106 yards of offense, the Cornhuskers, with the help of 3 interceptions, held a 12-10 lead with 1:44 to play. However, an out of bounds kickoff gave the Longhorns the ball on the 40 to start. A horse-collar tackle gave the drive a 15-yard boost. And with 1 second left Hunter Lawrence hit the game-winning 46-yard field goal.
Texas moves back into the #1 spot despite barely beating Nebraska. Their actual rating dropped from .8699 to .8617, but Florida dropped much further after getting blown out by Alabama. Alabama jumped from .8530 to .8583, and from #4 to #2, but it wasn’t quite enough to catch Texas.
TCU remains #3, Clemson’s loss didn’t help, as their rating dipped slightly from .8580 to .8557. The Army/Navy game will actually impact who finishes #3 or #4, as TCU needs a 33-20 (or better) win from Navy to maintain is razor-thin lead over Florida.
To see the ratings, please click the ‘read more’ link.
With only the Army/Navy game not played, the SEC has wrapped up the regular season as the top conference in the land. The ACC/Big 12/Big East follow behind very closely, with the Pac 10 and Big 10 bringing up the rear of the BCS conferences.
The Colonial had half of the Elite 8 and half of the Final Four in the FCS and placed ahead of 4 FBS conferences. I would really like to see the Ivy league in the FCS playoffs at some point as well, as WASEAN sees it as the second best FCS conference.
Please click the ‘read more’ link to see the ratings.
