I should probably save this hot topic for another day, but the airwaves from Bristol, Conn. are already smoldering.
Chris Fowler, Scott Van Pelt and Kirk Herbstreit are leading the debate over who should represent the Big 12 South in the conference title game, if Oklahoma wins out (defeating Texas Tech and Oklahoma State) creating a cluster of one-loss juggernauts.
As it stands the BCS rankings would decide who goes to Kansas City, which means it would essentially be up to the voters. Picking up the cause for the Longhorns, Fowler and company cannot comprehend a scenario where the Sooners would jump Texas, a team OU lost to in early October.
However, if the talking heads stopped pontificating for mere moments and listened to what else they were saying, they would have their answer.
Kirk Herbstreit has been boldly proclaiming that Florida is the best team in the country right now, despite being ranked No. 4 in the most recent BCS standings. And there's the magical answer.
The voters must decide which of the three squads (Texas, Texas Tech or Oklahoma) is the best team, who is playing the best football right now. Sure pollsters should take into account the outcome of the Red River rivalry, but in this 'imminent' scenario they should only keep Texas ahead of Oklahoma if they truly believe the outcome of their October game would be the same in late November.
Of all the top Big 12 teams, Oklahoma has the strongest full season resume right now with quality non-conference wins over TCU and Cincinnati. Texas Tech took down two I-AA (or FBS) schools and Texas ran over four I-A featherweights.
Again, this is just a relative debate right now, all contingent on an if. After all, the pundits have never, ever been wrong about pre-picking an outcome. Think about it, they nailed the 2002, 2005 and 2006 National Championship games.
2 comments:
Go Tech! End the debate with a win!
Since we now know that OU went on to pummel Texas Tech and put up 61 against OSU in the final two games, we can now debate the selection of OU as the Big 12 South representative. There are three reasons why OU deserves to be the Big 12 South champ.
First, OU has the best resume. There's no way to get around this. They dominated Big East champ Cincy, owned TCU from start to finish, and were far more impressive in their wins than any other team in college football. These facts are the main reason why the computers' average ranking for OU was #1.
Second, week 5 teams aren't Week 12teams. I know in the ideal scenario in football should be who beats who on the field (especially a neutral field), but there's no way to get around the fact that week 5 OU v. week 5 Texas isn't the best measure of which team is actually better. This is one of the unique aspects of college football. No other sport uses weighs schedule strength and other statistically relevant factors into deciding which team is the strongest. As it turns out, dominating opponents with scores of 60+ points, killing TTU, taking out a strong OSU team on the road, and playing a tougher schedule matter more than a poll of sportswriters and college coaches...weird.
Lastly, the Big 12 can choose whoever it wants, regardless of how "fair" their teams think it is. The conference will undoubtedly change the 5th tiebreaker to include something like, I don't know, graduation rates (nice one Mike Leech), but ultimately the decision of a conference (or division) champ rests with that conference. If they wanted to make Baylor the Big 12 South winner then that's their prerogative.
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