All is fair in love and sport

The Bowl Championship Series is a collection of 5 bowl games that take place after the regular college football season is completed. The top two teams in the final BCS standings play one another in the national championship game. There are a few problems however. Many times, as we have seen in recent years, it is difficult to determine exactly which two teams are the best in the nation. Another problem is that only a select few conferences get automatic bids to play in these prestigious games.
There are 11 conferences in the Football Bowl Subdivision and only six of the conference champions are automatically represented in the BCS (Big east, Big-12, Big-10, Pac-10, SEC and the ACC). Then there are five other conferences whos champions are guaranteed nothing for winning their respective conferences.(Mountain West, Western Athletic, Mid American, Conference USA and Sun Belt) What is the point of having conferences if the conference champion doesn’t have a chance to win a national title?
The benefits of the Bowl Championship Series are as follows. Revenue generation is second-to-none. College football is a multi-billion dollar industry, and that’s why we have seen congress try to step in and implement changes. Under the BCS system, every single regular season game has more importance than ever. The pressure to win every game is immense because one loss could potentially cost a team their season. For example, Texas last year.
What the BCS system prevents is having an equal playing field for all the teams in the Football Bowl-Subdivision (formerly division 1-A). In the Football Championship-Subdivision (formerly division 1-AA) every conference champion is represented in the playoff field as well as a few at-large bids. A playoff decides a true nation champion whereas the BCS leaves shades of grey and open debate. There is no arguing that this creates a lot more emotion and attention, but is it fair..? After all, equality is what this great country is based on, right?
Just this past year, the University of Oklahoma was voted into the national championship game over the University of Texas after Texas had beaten them head-to-head earlier in the year. Both teams only had one loss on the year, but the BCS polls decided that OU’s tougher schedule was enough to get the nod to play for the title. Oklahoma would go on to lose in the title game and Texas would go on to beat Ohio State in the Fiesta Bowl.
In the 2003-2004 season USC was third in the BCS poll after the last regular season game leaving OU and LSU to play for the title. USC dominated their opponent in the rose bowl game and was voted number one in the Associated Press poll but LSU won the national championship game.
In the 2004-2005 season Auburn, who plays in the SEC conference,(an automatic BCS qualifying conference) went undefeated and was left out of the national championship game.
Tim Griffin, writer for ESPN.com, thinks that the coaches poll should be made public because it opens criticism to why coaches picked who they picked, and helps eliminate block voting which is where all the coaches from a certain conference vote for the top team in their conference so their schools can receive more BCS money.
Many rules have been changed since the beginning of the BCS existence. More and more flaws are revealed every year to where BCS officials have to tweak the rules to make it as fair as they can. However, until they can include every conference champion in the mix, there will be an unleveled playing field.
This year we are seeing controversy unravel in front of our eyes yet again. With one week remaining in the regular season, there are still six undefeated teams. (Florida, Alabama, Texas, Texas Christian, Cincinnati and Boise State) Florida and Alabama will face off this Saturday eliminating one undefeated team, but leaves the possibility of having five undefeated teams at the end of the regular season. This means that three undefeated teams will not be playing for a national championship. Never before has there been an occasion like this. If the polls hold up then the winner of the Alabama-Florida game will face Texas in the BCS national championship game leaving TCU, Cincinnati and Boise on the outside looking in. The only logical fair way to settle something like this is through a playoff.
In an article written by ESPN college football analyst Chris Low, earlier this year the Mountain West Conference, who does not receive an automatic bid into the BCS series, submitted their proposal for an eight-team playoff where the top eight teams in the final BCS standings will play in a playoff tree to decide a national champion. The playoff idea was rejected however because there is already tons of money generated from many different bowl game sponsors.
In an interview with the Texas State director of sports information, Rick Poulter said, “Many teams who play in the lower tier bowl games actually lose money by traveling to these games.” If there was an eight or even 16-team playoff that would eliminate a lot of teams from traveling to mediocre bowl games who hardly anyone shows up to anyways. I propose a 16-team playoff where every conference champion receives an automatic bid and then the next top 5 teams in the final BCS standings will receive an at-large bid. The first round games would be played at the site of whichever school averages a higher attendance between the two and then having the quarter-finals round played at four regional sites which will be the four big BCS venues. (Rose bowl, Fiesta bowl, Sugar bowl and Orange bowl). One of the four major sites will host the national championship in rotation of years. The semi-finals round could be hosted by the Cotton bowl and one of the other four venues in rotation as well. This will make deciding a champion fair while still getting big advertising money from the five major bowl sites.
In a student poll I conducted on the Texas State University campus, 68 percent of students would rather see a playoff determine the nation champion over the current BCS system. Most people cited that they think it would simply be more exciting to watch and would eliminate controversy.
There is no question that the BCS has been a huge success in terms of dollars generated, but the bottom line is that the system is unfair, and all the nation wants to see is a fair shot for every team to win a national title.

Up to date BCS standings.