BCS Chaos Avoided – For Now

By Brett Samuels

If there was ever a day in college football with the potential to cause complete mayhem in the BCS standings, this past Saturday was it. Three of the top four teams had to face ranked opponents, with two of them going on the road.

Alabama traveled to Louisiana to play LSU, and Oregon visited USC. Notre Dame hosted unranked and underachieving Pittsburgh, and Kansas State had a home matchup with No. 24 Oklahoma State.

(AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

While it would have been perfectly reasonable if at least one of those teams fell victim to a quality opponent, the already chaotic BCS standings would have taken a turn for the worse.

Imagine if LSU had beaten Alabama, thus eliminating the only remaining unbeaten team from the SEC. It would have then been that the SEC, the nation’s most dominant conference, would not have a team in the national title game for the first time since 2005.

If Oregon lost to USC but then beat the Trojans in the Pac-12 title game, some would argue that the Ducks still deserved to play for the championship with one loss.

Or God forbid that three or even all four of the above teams suffered their first losses, an event that would have given around 10 teams in the country new life and likely crashed the BCS computer hard drives.

Fortunately for all of us we don’t live in a world of hypotheticals. And fortunately for those who have a fear of change, each of the top four teams in the BCS standings earned victories Saturday. However, each did so in a very different style.

Start with Alabama, the team with easily the most difficult game of the weekend. They had to go battle the No. 5 LSU Tigers, at Tiger Stadium.

ESPN’s Gene Wojciechowski described playing in Baton Rouge as follows:

“Imagine sitting in front of a refrigerator-sized speaker at a Metallica concert. And in back of you is a Pratt & Whitney jet engine, fully revved.”

Despite the intense atmosphere ‘Bama accomplished the unlikely and won at LSU, coming from behind to top things off. The teams went back and forth, playing about as close a game as is humanly possible until the Tide took the lead for good with a minute left at 21-17.

For Oregon it was a very different story. They had to face USC, a one-time national title favorite, at the Coliseum in Los Angeles. Unlike Alabama, the Ducks made quick work of USC, riding running back Kenjon Barner to the victory.

 According to ESPN.com’s Kevin Gemmell, Barner’s performance put him in the national spotlight.

“Barner justified his Heisman hype with an explosive performance, rushing for 321 yards and five touchdowns on 38 carries. It was an Oregon single-game rushing record,” Gemmell wrote.

After all was said and done the Ducks had won 62-51, and left few people doubting if they still were good to enough to earn a No.2 ranking in the BCS.

Kansas State quietly went about their business, defeating Oklahoma State 44-30, but quarterback Colin Klein was injured during the game. If the injury is severe, the Wildcats’ national title dreams could take a hit.

Then there’s Notre Dame. Just a week ago they went on the road and impressively dismantled Oklahoma. So this week it seemed they would have no problem beating a 4-4 Pittsburgh team. But nothing can ever be easy. It took the Irish an epic fourth quarter comeback, several lucky breaks, and three overtimes to defeat the Panthers 26-23.

Here’s what we can take away from Notre Dame’s narrow victory: while the Irish have come a long way since Brian Kelly took over three years ago, they simply don’t stack up with other undefeated teams, and should be left out of the title game if there are more than two teams left without a loss at the end of the year.

However each of the top four teams in the BCS standings play at least one ranked team before season ends, so there’s still plenty of hope for the Irish, as well as fans of drama and chaos everywhere, that we haven’t completely avoided BCS drama this season.