Attention KH: It was the computers

Kirk Herbstreit thinks Texas should represent the Big 12 South in KC on Saturday against Missouri. He thinks the head-to-head win in the Red River Shootout/Rivalry should be the deciding factor. That's fine. That's his opinion.

Kirk Herbstreit might be my favorite CFB analyst. However, I can't help but call him out for saying tonight that he thinks the "style" points of recent weeks led to the Sooners overtaking the Longhorns in the BCS rankings. He also mentioned the Sooners playing in prime time games as a reason that OU might have edged out Texas.

I think Texas is good. I think OU is slightly better. But, I'd love to see more good football to figure it out on the field. If you don't now what I'm talking about, please see my previous CFB posts. But, I think the system did everyone a favor - in the long run - by allowing the Sooners to go to KC instead of the Longhorns. Obviously, Texas isn't happy about it now.

But, OU gained ground on the Longhorns because they kept winning and the Longhorns lost to Texas Tech. And, after everything was said and done, OU had better wins than the UT. That's why the computers like OU. UT ended the year slightly ahead of OU in the combined poll portions of the BCS (just one point behind in the coaches' poll and six ahead in the Harris - although the Harris poll has about twice as many total points ... so the difference between the teams was about three times as high in the Harris as in the coaches', rather than 6 ... but, I digress). But, OU gained ground in the computers because TCU and Cincinnati moved up, while Missouri dropped significantly following the loss to KU. Plus, OU played at OSU, a very solid team that Texas had already played.

OU: 7. Texas Tech (65-21), 11. TCU (35-10), 13. Cincy (52-26), at 14. OSU (61-41)
UT: 2. OU (45-35), 14. OSU (28-24), 20. Missouri (56-31).

There is a reason the computers like OU, and I don't think it's style points and prime time games. It's because OU played tougher teams. And, the difference was the non-conference schedule. While Rice is contending in C-USA, they aren't an elite team. FAU is 6-6 and was just 4-3 in the Sun Belt. Arkansas and UTEP were both 5-7.

OU played Chattanooga, which is a total joke. And, UW ended up having a tough year, although they did play BYU tough with Jake Locker. The only full games Locker played were against Oregon, OU and BYU. But, the beef of the non-conference schedule for OU were, obviously, the games against TCU and Cincinnati. TCU was close to running the table in the MWC (they had a lead late at Utah) and Cincy won the Big East. Those two teams ended up being ranked higher than the second best team that Texas beat (OSU - who also lost to OU).

I think the pollsters were torn. OU lost head-to-head to Texas, but the Sooners lost first. People always say that losses early aren't as bad as losses late in the season. OU was impressive late in the season, but Texas had a pretty good showing against A&M to end the year as well. Well, obviously, the pollsters were torn. But, if you look at the computers, you see the key.

You often hear fight commentators say "You can't leave it in the hands of the judges ... if you don't finish the fight, anything can happen." Well, the same thing applies to CFB. Texas could round up tougher games (undoubtedly, so could OU). When no one on your non-conference schedule ends up in the top 25 at the end of the season and your competition has two non-conference wins over top 15 teams, who do you think the computers will prefer? I think this is a good precedent and I hope it creates more competitive non-conference games in the future.

But, I'm also a realist. I realize that coaches are walking the line trying to minimize the chance of losing while maximizing their status in the rankings. You want to play good teams, as long as you aren't going to lose the games ... because losses are, generally, really bad in CFB. So, this year went to OU. I think that is reasonable the way everything turned out.

Of course, part of the problem for coaches is that you never know how things will turn out. LSU, Auburn, WVU and Clemson were all mulling around the top 10 when the season began. Wisconsin, Kansas, Tennessee, and South Florida were all in the top 20. TCU and Cincy were "Others receiving votes".

And, this inability to forecast into the future is all the more reason to move to a system like the one I have advocated previously, where the non-conference games are systematically scheduled after the conference season to figure out where teams actually fall.

P.S. Jesse Palmer is on talking about "style points", "prime time television" and "losing early." I'd love to see the computer formulas ... but I'm guessing (pretty sure, actually) prime time TV isn't among the parameters.