Blue Diamonds

A Modest Proposal: How to Fix the BCS

This week, Boston College became the most recent No. 2 seed as well as unbeaten team to fall victim to an upset, throwing themselves into the midst of a sea of one-loss teams. The pollsters have decided that LSU is the best of them and moved them up into the 2-slot. A number of questions arise for the remainder of the season: if Kansas and Ohio State could win out, shouldn’t they play for the title? Kansas will most likely remain behind LSU and Oregon assuming they are not upset. And what about poor Hawaii, sitting at No. 16 and undefeated, with no ranked teams on its schedule? What about Arizona, whose only loss was to now No. 3 Oregon? What about UConn, this year’s surprise at 8-1 in a very tough Big East conference? And if Ohio State should lose a game, do they still deserve a shot at the title?

It comes up every year, but it is seriously time to get rid of the Bowl Championship Series, which has the top two teams play at the end of the year to determine the national champion of 1-A college football. With almost complete certainty, there will be some degree of controversy and disagreement about the national title game this year.

Here’s what the NCAA can do to fix the situation. A tournament with the following stipulations:

1) 26 teams qualify for the tournament of five rounds. Each of the eleven 1-A conference winners gets an automatic bid, and the other 15 bids are at-large, which could be selected via a committee, the AP poll, or the current BCS formula (if the NCAA is too sad to let it go). All the small conferences must be represented for the extreme value that all potential upsets have. This is to give a shot to all the Hawaiis and Boise States out there who dominate their opponents but don’t have tough schedules. Every team in every conference has a chance to play for the national title.

2) The six winners of the power conferences (Big East, Big 10, Big XII, SEC, ACC, and Pac 10) are ranked and all get byes to the second round. This increases the importance for the big schools to win their respective conferences and get a week of rest. It also ensures that great rivalries (Ohio St.-Michigan, USC-UCLA, Oklahoma-Texas for example) don’t happen in the first round when one of the teams has a good but not great season. Continue Reading A Modest Proposal: How to Fix the BCS…