The BCS is Dead!

Or at least on its last legs, hooked up to a heart-lung machine, just waiting to fade away into oblivion. In a truly important and long overview decision, a select committee of university presidents on Tuesday approved the BCS commissioners' plan for a four-team playoff to start in the 2014 season. This means that the very unfair and very much despised Bowl Championship Series will disappear at the end of next year. This will please just about everyone that doesn't have a vested interest in the status quo. It will also tap into the huge amount of genuine goodwill generated by basketball's March Madness, which is partially replicated.

The move completes a six-month process in which the commissioners have been working on a new way to determine a college football champion. Instead of simply matching the No. 1 and No. 2 teams in the country in a championship game after the regular season, the way the Bowl Championship Series has done since 1998, the new format will create a pair of national semifinals. No. 1 will play No. 4, No. 2 will play No. 3. The teams will be selected by a committee, similar to the way the NCAA basketball tournament field is set, with the winners advancing to the national championship game. Much better than the biased and exclusionary mess we have now.

End of the MWC?

I note with sadness, but appreciation, the move of Texas Christian University to leave the Mountain West Conference and forge new ties in the Big East. Completely understandable with the current and utterly useless BCS system; but only because of how that system works which has basically forced the change. But with it, possibly the death knell of the MWC has been sounded, which will become largely, the WAC version 2. A useless confederation of has-beens.

Broncos can't buck this trend

Republished from ESPN: So that's it, then. It's done. The fix is arranged. It's Game Over and everybody knows the score. The BCS computers TKO Boise State. Why keep punching when it's not a fair fight?

Auburn and Oregon are No. 1 and No. 2 in the country according to Sunday's latest, most fraudulent compilation yet from the BCS rankings. If those two schools win the rest of their games, they'll play in the BCS Championship Game.

And Boise State? Members of football's lowest caste system? It doesn't matter. The BSUntouchables play Louisiana Tech on Tuesday night, but they're just cleaning windows on the Titanic now. If Auburn and Oregon win out, Boise State can wipe out every opponent 50-0 and not make it in now. And the Broncos probably won't even if the Tigers and Ducks don't win out. Yes, we're talking about Auburn. The team that has 13 fewer wins over the past five seasons than Boise State. Yes, we're talking about Oregon. The same team Boise State punched out last season 19-8.

It's the biggest rip-off since the Nigerian prince scam. It makes you wonder why you watch college football at all. What Boise State is being asked to do isn't doable. It's like trying to win a Cuban election. Or break into the Genovese family.

The Broncos are 6-0. They've won 20 straight games, the longest streak in the country. They've beaten two BCS automatic qualifiers -- 6th-ranked Virginia Tech and 24th-ranked Oregon State. Doesn't matter. BSU could whip the 103rd Infantry and it wouldn't get a sniff. The computers are in charge. The pod bay doors won't open.

Boise State is going to get seated at the kids' table again. The Broncos will go to some pointless bowl and beat somebody like they always do -- they've already bested Oklahoma and TCU in bowls like that -- and they'll come home with a win and a hatful of "You kids sure play with a lot of heart up there" put-downs from the BCS blazers.

To read the complete article by Rick Reilly please click on the title link: "Broncos can't buck this trend".