Where is the respect for Utah?

I admit I don’t follow the BCS stuff very closely, but in just looking I don’t get why Utah isn’t ranked higher.

1. They’re 12-0
2. The Mountain West was decent this year, getting several big non conference wins against the Pac 10
3. Utah beat Oregon State, who handed USC their only loss

Utah seems to have a great case to at the very least be ranked ahead of USC. Now certainly Utah is not more talented than USC, but IMO it is presumptuous to assume that USC should be ranked in front of Utah because you would assume that USC would beat them. Isn’t the purpose of the BCS to put the teams in place based on what they have earned, and not how talented they are? If it is, then I can’t figure out why Utah is lower than them.

If Oklahoma some how manages to lose to Missouri, is there any shot of Utah getting into the national title game?

It is all about strength of schedule and the fact that they are not in a BCS conference. It may not be fair but that is how the system works. It is dominated by the big conferences.

This year's Boise State

Playing in one of the BCS sub-campionship bowl games. That is about as much as even the Mountain West can expect under the current system. It is almost impossible for a team from a non-BCS conference to make the national title game. An argument could be made if they beat USC instead of the team that beat USC - provided USC still tops the PAC-10.

Remember they also went into Michigan and won. In most other years this would have been a significant win when comparing Strength of Schedules. Too bad for the Utes that Michigan had the worst season in their history.

gopher7 said:

I admit I don’t follow the BCS stuff very closely, but in just looking I don’t get why Utah isn’t ranked higher.

1. They’re 12-0
2. The Mountain West was decent this year, getting several big non conference wins against the Pac 10
3. Utah beat Oregon State, who handed USC their only loss

Utah seems to have a great case to at the very least be ranked ahead of USC. Now certainly Utah is not more talented than USC, but IMO it is presumptuous to assume that USC should be ranked in front of Utah because you would assume that USC would beat them. Isn’t the purpose of the BCS to put the teams in place based on what they have earned, and not how talented they are? If it is, then I can’t figure out why Utah is lower than them.

If Oklahoma some how manages to lose to Missouri, is there any shot of Utah getting into the national title game?

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The Mountain West had three BCS-caliber teams. But the bottom of the Mountain West was terrible as usual, and that's mostly who Utah played all season.

Utah only played 2 BCS opponents. Even if you throw-in BYU and TCU, that's still only 4. BCS-conference teams have to play EIGHT. If they wanted more respect they shuld have scheduled a game against a team in the Big 12 and SEC too. At 6 BCS games they may be able to make the case that they have a similar schedule to a BCS-conference team.

I give them credit for scheduling Michigan and Oregon State. But they needed two more games like that.

bushwood manor said:

Too bad for the Utes that Michigan had the worst season in their history.

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Or good for the Utes, because a vintage Michigan team may have sent Utah home with a loss and killed their BCS hopes.

I will never understand

holding a team accountable for how well your opponents do. Strength of schedule is stupid when they do it this way.

A possible solution that would still keep the philosphy of playing strong teams vs weak teams to pad your wins is this....

Strength of schedule should have only two or three components... First, only Div 1 counts. Second, total wins vs losses for all of your opponents together. If its a winning record give a score of 1. If its a losing record give a score of 0. Third your overall record percentage vs your competitors overall percentage

Heads to head matchups should have much higher clout than A, beat B beat C, who beat A etc....

Lastly, I hate the BCS. A playoff like the NCAA basketball tournament (not 64 teams, only 16) would be great for fans and for the NCAA itself! A playoff gets rid of all these stupid arguments that consume college football today...

NateDawgUM said:

Or good for the Utes, because a vintage Michigan team may have sent Utah home with a loss and killed their BCS hopes.

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And they nearly lost that game to this year's Michigan.

Maverick said:

Lastly, I hate the BCS. A playoff like the NCAA basketball tournament (not 64 teams, only 16) would be great for fans and for the NCAA itself! A playoff gets rid of all these stupid arguments that consume college football today...

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I love the arguments! A playoff gets rid of all of the intriguing early season match-ups that define a season.

No way Utah should have any chance at playing in the National Championship game. Isn't going to a BCS bowl enough respect? Like someone mentioned already, they played 2 BCS games, 4 with BYU and TCU. The most of the Mountain West is horrible. Schedule all the non-conference games against top notch BCS schools if you want to be considered for the National Championship game.

NateDawgUM said:

I love the arguments! A playoff gets rid of all of the intriguing early season match-ups that define a season.

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Are you implying that if there is a playoff teams won't schedule good games in September?

I disagree. It is all in how many teams you take (most people say 8). If you assume the current BCS formulas are kept in place to determine participants but the number of at large berths is reduced from 4 to 2 teams will be encouraged to increase their strength of schedule. For instance, assume all 6 BCS conferences get an at large berth and the BCS buster clause is still in place so the first at large goes to Utah.

The teams in (I'm making assumptions about the winners of the conference championships) with seeds:
1. Big 12: Oklahoma
2. SEC: Florida
3. BCS at large 2: Alabama/Texas
4. Pac 10: USC
5. BCS at large 1: Utah
6. Big Ten: Penn State
7. ACC: Virginia Tech
8. Big East: Cincinnati

The loser of the Florida/Alabama game is competing with Texas for the last seed in the tournament. Which leaves the debate about whether Texas or Alabama deserves to be in the tourney (in what would probably be the 3 seed).

Because there are only 2 at-large berths, and one may be filled by a BCS buster, teams are encouraged to make their non-conference schedule as competitive as possible to have the best resume. For instance, if Ohio State played E. Michigan instead of USC and they ended up 11-1 they would definitely lose the comparison vs. Alabama or Texas. However, if they were 11-1 by beating USC you could make an argument that despite a down year in the conference they deserve to be in the tourney because they beat USC. And because the champion of the Big Ten gets an at large berth Ohio State is not hurt by playing USC in the non-conference--in fact because of the Big Ten's tie breaker having DI-AA Youngstown State on the schedule has more of an impact than having USC on the schedule.

respectfully disagree

NateDawgUM said:

I love the arguments! A playoff gets rid of all of the intriguing early season match-ups that define a season.

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Has the March Madness tournament eliminated intriguing non-conference matchups in basketball??? Not at all! In fact I would argue there are more and better out of conference matchups in basketball than ever before... Look at the Acc vs Big Ten challenge for example. This is a relatively new thing and it is really fun and intriguing!

A "December Dance" tournament would be more fun than ever and the excitement of choosing the teams for sixteen spots to compete for a national title would far exceed the excitement generated by the political crap going into choosing only two teams for that honor....

I have also said before that the bowl structure could remain in place for those teams not included in the tournament structure... kinda like the NIT is for baketball, only not a tournament like the NIT...

Lloyd Braun said:

No way Utah should have any chance at playing in the National Championship game. Isn't going to a BCS bowl enough respect? Like someone mentioned already, they played 2 BCS games, 4 with BYU and TCU. The most of the Mountain West is horrible. Schedule all the non-conference games against top notch BCS schools if you want to be considered for the National Championship game.

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The problem with this is that Utah likely would not be able to find 4 BCS teams to play every year. It's doubtful Michigan or Oregon State is beating down the Utes door trying to schedule a rematch after what they did to them this year.

I guess what it comes down to for me, is how is a smaller conference team ever supposed to have a shot to win a national championship? To me, Utah has done about all it realistically can this year to get in the national title game. They went undefeated in their conference, beating two top 25 teams along they way. They scheduled and beat Michigan, the winning program of all time, and Oregon State, a semi regular top 25 team over the last 10 years. If what Utah did this year is still not enough, then what is the point of having non-BCS conferences? Do they exist only for the amusement of the top 6? There has to be some chance, little as it may be, for everyone to get that shot. I'm not saying Utah deserves this over an undefeated team like Alabama, but there has to be at least some discussion when looking at 1 loss teams like USC.

Maverick said:

Has the March Madness tournament eliminated intriguing non-conference matchups in basketball??? Not at all! In fact I would argue there are more and better out of conference matchups in basketball than ever before... Look at the Acc vs Big Ten challenge for example. This is a relatively new thing and it is really fun and intriguing!

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The early season basketball games are still fun to watch, but they have ZERO implications for the National Title.

College Football is unique in being the only sport where the entire season is weighed down with title implications. I enjoy it that way.

I enjoyed it a lot more when teams stuck with their old tie-ins. A few years you had teams entering bowl season at #3, #4 or #5 who emerged on JANUARY 2 as the #1 team in the country.

Now we have the Fox Presents BCS National Title game sponsored by Citi/AIG/GM on January 23rd. Not quite the same.

I wonder if the WAC and the MWC couldn't take the top teams from each and make a new BCS-caliber conference.

Wilbon (who I hate btw) talked about Utah on PTI today, and it was mentioned that Utah has beaten more Top 20 teams than Alabama (though that will change if Bama wins in the SEC champ).

gopher7 said:

The problem with this is that Utah likely would not be able to find 4 BCS teams to play every year. It's doubtful Michigan or Oregon State is beating down the Utes door trying to schedule a rematch after what they did to them this year.

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That just not true. There are a lot of BCS-conference teams that would love to schedule a home and home with Utah. It's not happening becuase non-BCS teams have discovered this "loophole" where they can take a back-door into a BCS bowl with only 2 BCS wins. The incentive for watering down the non-conference schedule is overwheliming.

The Big L said:

Wilbon (who I hate btw) talked about Utah on PTI today, and it was mentioned that Utah has beaten more Top 20 teams than Alabama (though that will change if Bama wins in the SEC champ).

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What Alabama did to Georgia, LSU and Clemson is a lot more impressive than what Utah did to TCU, Oregon or Michigan.

The rankings are not as objective as how many top 10 or top 20 games did you win. People that know football watch the games and compare teams. Alabama would dominate the line of scrimmage against Utah and they would absolutely kill them.