BCS...More Like B.S.

With the college football season about halfway through, the talk is turning to the BCS national championship. Usually all of the sports analysists are talking about a few top level teams such as USC, Michigan, Ohio State, Texas, or Oklahoma as being in the race for the national championship. This year however, because of several upsets, the teams that will be vying for the title are still up in the air and the validity of the BCS system is in question.
Over the first half of the season, there have been a ton of upsets that have shaken the world of college football. Many of the perennial powerhouses have lost close games. There are only three division one programs left in the country without a loss: Ohio State, Southern Florida, and Boston College. Some of the big names schools that lost are LSU, Oklahoma, USC, Cal, Florida, and Auburn. No one knows who will be in the running for the championship at the end of the season.
College football currently uses the Bowl Championship Series, or BCS, rankings to select teams to play for the national championship. The rankings use a combination of a computer ranking, a coaches rating, and the AP poll to select the teams who will play in the championship. In most years, this ranking is usually a fairly accurate method of finding the two best teams in the nation to play each other, but not this year!
Since the championship teams are determined by a computer ranking, many people feel they do no accurately reflect the best teams. Opponents to the BCS rankings say that rankings mean nothing and the only way to determine who is better is to play the game. Teams that play weak competition may get a high ranking and gain an invitation to a bowl game. One loss to a quality program can wreck a team’s chances of going all the way.
Many college football fans, including Sean Thomforde and Kelby Buck, are not happy with the BCS ranking system.
“It really is a load of BCS,” said Sean Thomforde. To which Kelby Buck replied,
“Yeah, I feel sorry for LSU! They really got screwed this year.”
The colleges have a long break before their championship game and it would not be difficult to squeeze in a tournament. Because of all the controversy surrounding the rankings, the BCS system should be done away with and a tournament should take its place.