It can’t happen again – can it? Seven unbeaten teams. Six weeks left. Two berths in the Rose Bowl in the national championship game.
Will there be another Auburn, a team with a perfect record playing for nothing more than … than … than … um, what exactly does the winner of the Orange Bowl get? Most likely, it will get sympathy.
Considering that in four of the past five years controversy has stained the seven-year-old Bowl Championship Series’ selection for its national title game, you’d think there would be a movement for another format. Outside of sports bars and press boxes, there isn’t.
“I don’t know if you could work it with Division I teams,” Miami coach Larry Coker said during Wednesday’s Atlantic Coast Conference conference call. “It would be very, very difficult. I guess you’d have it be the last man standing. But do you have four, six, eight, 16? Whoever you left out, the 17th team would feel they should be there.”
With the season just over the halfway mark, there are unbeatens left in Southern California (No. 1 in Monday’s first BCS rankings), No. 2 Texas, No. 3 Virginia Tech (which defeated Maryland 28-9 on Thursday), No. 4 Georgia, No. 5 Alabama, No. 7 Texas Tech and No. 9 UCLA. One will be eliminated Saturday when Texas Tech visits Texas, and Alabama may meet Georgia in the Southeastern Conference title game.
But can you imagine the SEC and ACC having unbeaten champions and not going to the Rose Bowl for the national championship? It could happen if USC and Texas win out and stay 1-2 in the BCS.
“I would be sad for our players if that happened, certainly, but I’d be thrilled to death to think we could go through a season without losing a game,” Georgia coach Mark Richt told reporters this week. “College football is better than any sport in America and maybe the world. Take the Southern Cal-Notre Dame game. If you had like a 16-team playoff system and that game was over, they’d probably say, ‘Aw, we’ll get them later.’ That game, the way it was, was a do-or-die game.”
Florida State coach Bobby Bowden, in his 40th year, said a playoff isn’t practical.
“I don’t like to extend the season,” he said. “To me, the season ought to be over on the 1st, 2nd or 3rd (of January). I don’t want them to come back to school and we say, ‘OK, put your uniform on and practice again.’
“And say we have three games. Play one in Memphis. Then one in Seattle. People don’t have the money to go to Seattle so they don’t go to that one. I’m just not sold on it yet.”
Divisions I-AA, II and III have full playoff brackets through December. Coker thinks lower divisions live in a different world.
“One year we had six first-round draft choices,” Coker said. “Those guys were millionaires when they signed their name. How many games do you want them to play? How many realistically should expose themselves to and risk injury such as Willis McGahee? The other divisions, most of their careers are over after a championship game. I see a little different scenario there.”
On paper, it’s easy to see a nice, clean scenario where only two unbeatens remain. After all, not once in the BCS’ first seven years have the top two teams in the first rankings played for the national title. Five times, one-loss teams have played undefeated teams for the national championship.
This year, Virginia Tech still must play No. 13 Boston College, No. 8 Miami and, possibly, No. 11 Florida State, in the ACC title game. Georgia still has No. 20 Florida, and No. 18 Auburn besides the SEC championship. Alabama has No. 19 Tennessee Saturday, No. 6 Louisiana State and Auburn while UCLA visits USC in the regular-season finale.
“It’s much more likely a one-loss team will be in the Rose Bowl than a third unbeaten team will be left out,” said Jerry Palm of collegebcs.com.
Perfect … so far
Seven of the top nine teams in the Bowl Championship Series rankings are unbeaten this season:
1. Southern Cal
2. Texas
3. Virginia Tech*
4. Georgia
5. Alabama
7. Texas Tech
9. UCLA
*- with Thursday’s win
Staff writer John Henderson can be reached at jhenderson@denverpost.com or 303-820-1299.
