College Football Championships with A Plus-One: The 2008 Season
The 2011 season is commonly regarded as the death of the Bowl Championship Series. Realistically, ‘11 and the Rematch No One Wanted1 was more like the funeral service for the BCS, which died three years earlier in the 2008 season.
Political intrigue, a memorable SNL skit and Florida’s second national championship in three years, which should come with a massive asterisk for a variety of reasons, all combined to deliver fatal blows to the national championship system.
It’s debatable whether Florida was worthy of its spot in the title game, say nothing of claiming an undisputed crown. The ‘08 season, even more than ‘07, concluded with a logjam at the top. The Big 12 alone had three one-loss teams at the end of the regular season, Pac-10 champion USC and Big Ten champion Penn State both also only lost once, and Utah was undefeated.
USC played 12 power-conference opponents that season: at Virginia, Ohio State and Notre Dame. The win over Ohio State was 1-of-2 the Trojans boasted against teams ranked in the top 15 of the final, pre-bowl season poll; Florida had one2, which came over Alabama in the 13th game. Both lost to opponents ranked in the final Top 25, but USC’s defeat against Oregon State came on the road, on a Thursday night, the game after the Trojans blasted Ohio State, 35-3, and rolled past Oregon, 44-10.
Florida lost at home to Ole Miss. The home/away distinction on its own should have carried more weight, but the other contributing factors also lean in USC’s favor.
Then there’s Utah. The Utes were one of only two FBS teams to advance to bowl season with a perfect record, the other being Boise State. The Broncos scored a win over Oregon, which was No. 15 at the end of the regular season, but Utah put together the more impressive overall resume.
In fact, one could make a case that Utah had the most title game-deserving resume of any team in the ‘08 BCS. The Utes concluded the regular season with three Top 25 wins, more than either Florida or USC. Among them was a 31-28 defeat of Oregon State — the same Oregon State responsible for USC’s sole blemish — one week after the Beavers bested the Trojans.
And while this wouldn’t factor into BCS championship equations, Utah absolutely ran circles around Alabama in the Sugar Bowl, which should have factored into the Associated Press national championship. I have long contended AP voters badly whiffed not splitting the title that season.
Meanwhile, Florida beat Oklahoma in a lackluster Championship Game, memorable mostly for Thom Brennaman behaving embarrassingly in his praise of Tim Tebow.
One can only assume a teenaged Nick Castellanos homered for Archbishop McCarthy High School the same day as the 2009 BCS Championship Game.
While the Big 12 deserved one of the two BCS Championship bids that season by virtue of finishing with three teams ranked in the final top 8, Oklahoma advanced to the Big 12 Championship Game and thus scored the all-important 12th win through rather dubious means: The conference’s tiebreaker was determined by BCS computer points.
Texas — arguably the opponent better equipped to take down Florida that season — beat Oklahoma by double-digits in the Red River Shootout and finished the pre-conference championship weekend regular season with as many Top 25 wins as the Sooners3. The Longhorns' sole defeat came on the road, via one of the greatest final plays ever executed in college football history.
Put it all together, and the 2008 season — one of my personal favorites in my many years following and covering the sport — ended with one of the most dubious national championships.
Others held the same opinion.
In the days following bowl season, Will Forte sang a song, “I Love the BCS,” on Saturday Night Live Weekend Update that was an…ode…to the Bowl Championship Series. Because SNL is absolutely horrible about archiving and making individual clips easily shareable, you’ll have to read the lyrics as opposed to getting to hear them:
I love stepping in dog crap
And I live it when children get sick
I love paper cuts on my corenas
And I love the BCS
I love hanging at the DMVZ
And I love finding out I’m adopted
I love eating tacos filled with uncooked chicken
And I love the BCS
Oh yeah, I love the BCS
It’s the best system ever devised
Neck-and-neck with the Electoral College
And if you’ve got some kinda problem with that
I invite you to S my D
S my D
S my D
S my D
BCS
S my D
I love the smell of sick people’s farts
And I love George W. Bush
I wish he could my dad and my lover
And I love the BCS
I love thinking about Bush with his shirt off
I love taking off his pants with my mind
He’s the lame duck that I really want to f…Can I say it?
Can we switch over to HBO really quick and then I can say it?
…Fudge! And I love the BCS
Oh yeah I love the BCS
And my hemorrhoids!
I love the BCS
Robert Mugabe!
I love the BCS
Considering this was just three weeks after the incident with the Iraqi journalist throwing his shoes at Pres. Bush, the 43rd Commander-in-Chief was really catching it from all sides. Hell, even the BCS indirectly got one over on Bush, a Texas Longhorns fan who surely wasn’t thrilled with the process that got UT passed over the BCS Championship Game.
Meanwhile, the 44th President, Barack Obama, came out against the BCS as the then-President-Elect.
For others, dismantling the BCS wasn’t mere political rhetoric but an actionable political pursuit. Utah’s Attorney General Mark Shurtleff pushed for an antitrust investigation into the Bowl Championship Series, and Sen. Orrin Hatch formed a committee to that end.
Thus, 10 years after it began, the BCS was dealt the blow that began a five-year death sentence. The 2008 season effectively killed the system, but in true Monkey’s Paw4 fashion, created an arguably worse system with the College Football Playoff.
When I contend the Playoff is worse, the 2008 season is a prime example. In no way do I believe the four-team format would have included a Utah squad that should have been in the National Championship Game under the two-team parameters, based both on the Utes being ranked seventh when they embarked on the Sugar Bowl, and that Cincinnati needed one of the most volatile regular seasons in recent college football history to land its spot in the final four in 2021.
But ‘08 is also the rare instance in which that my Plus-One format also would have been a mess. I detest the Playoff’s expansion to 12 teams — not because I’m inherently opposed to a football tournament, as I cover FCS and enjoy its postseason — but because it feels like yet another Trojan horse for the TV networks to restructure FBS as NFL Lite.
Ergo, you know it’s a unique set of circumstances when I concede that a 12-team playoff would have been the ideal means of crowning a national champion in 2008. Such a tournament would have looked as follows:
8. Texas Tech vs. 9. Boise State - winner advances to face No. 1 Florida
5. USC vs. No. 12 Cincinnati - winner advances to face No. 4 Alabama
7. Utah vs. No. 10 Ohio State - winner advances to face No. 2 Oklahoma
6. Penn State vs. 11. TCU - winner advances to face No. 3 Texas
As for the Plus-One, a few things of note include I spurned Cincinnati from the Big East’s traditional Orange Bowl slot by virtue of the Bearcats falling outside the top 10, and Big 12 representative Oklahoma having a path to the Plus-One Championship Game.
Normally, I would defer to tradition — hell, tradition is the primary framework of this entire exercise. However, serving as the default postseason event for the Big East champion was a relatively new development prior to the formation of the BCS, and the Big East affiliation was more or less grandfathered in due to so many of the peak Miami teams playing in it from ‘83 through ‘91.
Also, while I contend Texas was more deserving of the Big 12 Championship Game than Oklahoma, I am adhering to history with OU as the No. 2 team and recipient of the Orange Bowl berth. However, in a scenario that both Oklahoma and Texas were to win their bowl games, Texas would receive the Plus-One invitation.
Rather than go through game-by-game as in past installments, since the preamble this time was so long, let’s go through a quick run-through of the pecking order for advancing to the National Championship Game:
Utah is in a win-and-it’s-in scenario at the Sugar Bowl as one of only two undefeated teams, and a defeat of Florida representing four Top 25 victories. Among other title-game contenders, only Oklahoma would have more with an Orange bowl win, and OU would have had an extra game to reach five.
Oklahoma is in with an Orange Bowl victory over Alabama and one of either Florida beating Utah or Boise State beating Texas.
USC is in with a Rose Bowl win over Penn State and one of either Florida defeating Utah in the Sugar Bowl, or Alabama beating Oklahoma in the Orange Bowl. The Trojans offered the more convincing case than UF for the reasons detailed above, and receive precedent over Texas and Alabama by virtue of winning their conference.
Florida is in with a Sugar Bowl win and one of either Penn State beating USC or Alabama beating Oklahoma. The Sooners hold the tiebreaker over the Gators by virtue of more end-of-season Top 25 wins and a stronger loss that occurred on a neutral field as opposed to home.
Penn State is a wild card. The Nittany Lions are the sole one-loss team heading into the postseason with its defeat coming to an unranked opponent in the final regular-season poll. That opponent, Iowa, won its bowl game to reach nine wins overall and climbed to No. 20 in the post-bowl season poll. As Big Ten champion, and with Top 25 defeats of Oregon State in the non-conference, and Michigan State and Ohio State in league, Penn State could realistically leapfrog Florida with a convincing Rose Bowl win.
Rose Bowl Game: No. 5 USC vs. No. 6 Penn State
Sugar Bowl: No. 1 Florida vs. No. 7 Utah
Orange Bowl: No. 2 Oklahoma vs. No. 4 Alabama
Fiesta Bowl: No. 3 Texas vs. No. 9 Boise State
Cotton Bowl: No. 8 Texas Tech vs. No. 11 TCU
Alabama was the best team in the nation in 2011 and absolutely, positively did not deserve to play for the BCS Championship per the precedent set for 13 years prior to the Tide getting a mulligan vs. LSU. And, while I plan to explore this in greater depth in the 2011 Plus-One column, both Alabama-LSU games that season were dreadful, revisionist history touting the first installment as an epic clash be damned.
Florida’s other signature win was over Georgia, which was ranked No. 16.
Oklahoma beat Texas Tech, TCU and Oklahoma State; Texas beat Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and Missouri, the last of which OU faced in the Big 12 Championship Game.