Who needs a playoff

Last weekend was the first good college football weekend; yes there were good games and interesting storylines prior to October 21^st, but last Saturday we finally saw some overrated undefeated big conference teams get exposed. Week after week I was stunned by so called "experts" penciling Oklahoma in the BCS title game, I kept asking myself if I was the only person to watch the Ok/FSU game, where Oklahoma struggled to put away an FSU team that made more errors than the Brewers in the NLCS and played the second half with their back-up quarterback? At the time FSU was thought to be a top 5 team, over the past couple of weeks they were proven to not be a top 5 team in the ACC. It was only a matter of time before Oklahoma was exposed and that it came at home to Texas Tech makes their faults even clearer.

Wisconsin took advantage of a terrible out of conference and early Big 10 schedule to look like world beaters until they played their first road game vs. a decent opponent (Mich St.). Was it really shocking to see the Wiscy defense shredded and Russell Wilson come up short? Wilson was a good off-season pick-up (transfer) for a team that desperately needed a QB, but this is the same Wilson that was .500 as a starting QB vs. BCS opponents at NC State.

Even more head scratching then these two results is the fact that the "experts" have now gone on to speculate on who will play the SEC champ in the BCS title game. I keep hearing about OK St, Stanford, Clemson, or even Boise; don't get me wrong I think they are good teams and would love to see the four of them matchup in BCS bowls (Clemson vs. Boise in the Orange and OK St vs. Stanford in the Fiesta), but none of them are in the class of LSU and Alabama.

There is a simple solution to this process that doesn't involve the scariest word for the NCAA, "playoff". The SEC, the most proactive, proud, and a little full of themselves conference should allow these two teams to met in the SEC title game after their regular season meeting November 5^th @ Alabama. They are head and shoulders above the rest of college football so it only makes sense that a rematch on a neutral field will be required after November 5^th. No one wants to see an overmatched sacrificial lamb like South Carolina or Georgia loss by 50 when the second best team in the country is getting ready for the Sugar Bowl. If they split the regular season and conference title game matchups then it only makes sense that the rubber match would be in the BCS title game. I am all for a playoff, but this year there is no need for one, the two best teams are obvious and 3 games featuring LSU/Bama would be great for college football and college football fans. With a dose of truth serum not even David Shaw (yes, that is Stanford's coach, ask 10 sports fans who Stanford's football coach is and I bet not half would say Shaw whereas everyone knows Duke legend Johnny Dawkins is their hoops coach), a man like Mike Gundy, or Dabo Swinney in his Rickie Fowler orange pants would say their teams are better than a one loss LSU or Alabama team. What would Vegas have to make the LSU/Bama winner vs. Stanford, Ok St, or Clemson? My guess is double digits

It happens all the time in other sports, the Cardinals and Brewers just finished the NLCS and the NFC title game last season was the third time Green Bay played Chicago and can't you just see the SEC (with a little push from CBS) upstaging every other conference title game by announcing an amendment to the conference by-laws that allows LSU a rematch with Bama on a neutral field? If LSU were to win that game each team would have one loss and with the human polls and computers (who rightfully love the SEC), they would be the top 2 teams in the BCS standings even with an undefeated ACC or PAC 10 team?

The conference that has won 5 straight BCS titles should have the guile to make this change and let the NCAA handle the complaints from the other conferences. All this conference expansion was supposed to make for better conference champions, but is anyone looking forward to Stanford/ASU, Wiscy/Mich St. (again) or Clemson/V Tech (again)? This answer is clearly no, but LSU/Bama parts 2 and hopefully 3 would be must see sporting events not just college football games.