Shift the Focus

In my opinion, people around college football are too negative ... they dwell too much on losses and almost totally neglect wins. Let's run down the nominees, going from 1-10 in the BCS rankings (Sagarin rankings):

Ohio State:
at Michigan (27), Wisconsin (30), at Penn State (31), Michigan State (40)

LSU:
Florida (4), Virginia Tech (5), neutral Tennessee (17), Auburn (18), South Carolina (36), at Alabama (41)

Virginia Tech:
at Clemson (14), neutral BC (19), at Virginia (32), Florida State (34), at Georgia Tech (47)

Oklahoma:
neutral Missouri (9), Missouri (9), neutral Texas (25), Texas A&M (38), Oklahoma State (43)

Georgia:
neutral Florida (4), Auburn (18), Kentucky (23), at Alabama (41), Oklahoma State (43), at Georgia Tech (47)

Missouri:
neutral Kansas (3), neutral Illinois (21), Texas Tech (29), Texas A&M (38), at Colorado (50)

USC:
at Arizona State (11), Oregon State (20), at Cal (37), UCLA (39), Arizona (48)

Kansas:
at Texas A&M (38), at Oklahoma State (43), at Colorado (50)

West Virginia:
at Cincinnati (15), Connecticut (26), at Rutgers (42), Louisville (44), at Maryland (49)

Hawaii:
Boise State (28)

Despite an undefeated season, Hawaii is out because they didn't do enough out of conference. I don't need to see wins over Michigan and USC, but wins over some good C-USA and Mountain West teams like UCF, Utah, BYU, TCU, Air Force, Tulsa, etc. would bolster the resume. They didn't do enough in their game against #53 Washington (who beat Boise State) to get them in my title game.

Kansas didn't win their half of the Big 12 and didn't have a really good win on their schedule, although they did play the toughest part of their schedule on the road. Similarly, Ohio State needed to run the table because not beating Illinois (21) makes Michigan (27) their best win. Note to Tressel and Mangino, if you schedule a weak non-conference slate and the teams on your conference schedule aren't as good as you expect, you might run into some trouble. That's the case this year ... OSU and KU are out.

We're left with LSU, Virginia Tech, Oklahoma, Georgia, Missouri, USC and WVU. Oklahoma's two head-to-head wins over Missouri do the trick in that match-up, eliminating the Tigers from national title contention. A win by Mizzou in the Big 12 Championship would have vaulted the Tigers into the final two, with a tough loss at Norman and wins over OU, KU and Illinois. But, they fell short in San Antonio and they are falling short here.

Comparing WVU to OU, we have to eliminate the Mountaineers. The numbers don't lie: 9-9-25-38-43 beat 15-26-42-44-49. The losses and injuries to Pat White and Sam Bradford in those games detract equally from the resumes, so the Sooners are still in it. For similar reasons, the USC Trojans are eliminated: 11-20-37-39-48 isn't quite enough ... and the loss to the lowest rated team in the Pac-10 doesn't do anything to help.

So, we're down to the final 4, Va Tech, OU, LSU and Georgia. LSU's wins are tough to beat, and it's hard to find too much fault in OT losses to Kentucky (23) and Arkansas (24). But, Georgia has some good wins and decent losses to South Carolina (36) and Tennessee (17). Oklahoma's wins are similar but the losses are a bit worse. But, if you give a little leeway for Bradford's concussion against Texas Tech, things are pretty dang close. Va Tech's wins don't quite match OU's, and the 48-7 loss to LSU is a major detractor.

I'd love to see the system tweaked so that we have more good wins (and losses) to look at to evaluate the teams. But, going off what we have, I'll have to lean toward a Georgia or Oklahoma v. LSU match-up. If you're fine with not even winning your half of your conference and still playing for the national title, then go with Georgia v. LSU. Personally, I think you should have to win your half and at least play in your conference title game (if your conference has one, which all the conferences that are divided in half do), so I'm going to go with LSU and Oklahoma in my national title match-up.

And, while we're on the subject of national championship games, any chance we can get the game moved if it is going to be a home game for one of the teams. LSU shouldn't play for the national title in the Sugar Bowl. USC and UCLA shouldn't host the national title game at the Rose Bowl. Miami shouldn't participate in a national championship Orange Bowl game. And, ASU shouldn't play for all the marbles in the Fiesta Bowl ... not that I see ASU playing for all the marbles any time soon.