Is it Possible?
by knowshon loves legos on Oct 8, 2009 1:11 PM EDT
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To have 2 SEC teams in the national Championship? I was doing some research today and I noticed that the SEC is 5-0 in BCS National Title games... pretty impressive. Not sure how my thought process came to this but I was wondering if it's possible for 2 teams from the SEC to face off in the Nat'l Championship game. Here's what I thought could be a likely scenario:
UGA upsets Florida by less than a score, wins out and wins the east.
Alabama contiues dominance and faces UGA in SECCG
Alabama routes UGA, goes undefeated
No other team finishes undefeated.
What's the case that people believe Florida and Bama are still the two best teams in the nation? and finish 1/2 in the polls?
What if i said Fla lost to UGA on some BS call at the end of the game that gave it to UGA.
What if the other one loss teams' one loss was worse?
Would people vote Florida out of 2nd just so it wouldn't be an SEC game? Or would they let this happen.
How about this? UF gets jobbed in Jax, all other one loss teams look bad in thier loss, but BYU goes undefeated (along with Bama).
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Put simply...
not going to happen. The voters are not going to put two SEC teams in the national championship…nor are they going to put a team that did not win its respective conference into the national championship. For examples, see Ohio State vs. Michigan in 2006 and UGA in 2007.
Of course...
2001 Nebraska and 2003 Oklahoma did not win the Big 12, but got to the BCS title game anyway. Though they’ve changed the BCS formula a lot since then, and the voters have enough influence over the results in the current formula to prevent it from happening again even without explicitly barring it. It’s a dead certainty that a one-loss Big 12, Big Ten, or Pac 10 champ, or an undefeated Big East champ or ACC champ (can’t happen this year in the ACC) would be voted ahead of a one-loss SEC runner up. Somewhat borderline for a one-loss ACC or Big East team, or an undefeated non-BCS team.
About the only way I could see the voters not going into contortions to avoid a game between two teams in the same conference is if there were two undefeated Big Ten teams that did not play in the regular season (ala Iowa and Ohio State in 2002, if the Hawkeyes hadn’t lost a non-conference game), and they were the only undefeated teams.
The difference in 2006 . . .
. . . was that Michigan and Ohio State met during the regular season. The Wolverines had their shot.
Your 2007 Georgia example is right on point, though.
Go 'Dawgs!
My point about Michigan and Ohio State was not...
that they had not faced one another. It was in reference to the sentence “What’s the case that people believe Florida and Bama are still the best two teams in the nation?” In 2006, many people (voters and pundits alike) still considered Ohio State and Michigan to be the two best teams in the nation (Kirk Herbstreit included). The argument against the two teams playing was two-fold, including both the example you cited, as well as the fact that Michigan did not win its conference (Georgia fans, of course, have pointed to the latter example many times when talking about Kirk Herbstreit completely flipping his script within one year).
However, Kyle, had Michigan and Ohio State not met in the last game of their respective seasons, would your argument (that they had already faced one another) be different? For example, if Georgia went through the season undefeated, winning the SEC Championship, and South Carolina went through the season with one loss (a close one against the Dawgs), would there be a valid argument for the two to meet again in the National Championship, given that there were no other undefeated teams?
Additionally (and I know that I’m giving huge hypotheticals with many qualifiers), if you put this same scenario to work, changing only the variable of the two teams residing in the same conference, how would it change? In my opinion, we would be much more likely to see a rematch of two out-of-conference teams who played a hard-fought game early in the year (a la Alabama & Virginia Tech) than to see the same matchup involving two teams from the same conference.
by hailtogeorgia on Oct 9, 2009 9:13 AM EDT up reply actions
It's happened
See UF, FSU 2006
Not only did they play in the regular season, but they met in the LAST GAME of the regular season and still faced off for the crown. Alabama and Va Tech would be even more acceptable as the game would be distant from everyone’s memory
by knowshon loves legos on Oct 10, 2009 9:47 AM EDT up reply actions
That last sentence sounds fine and dandy except...
BYU is no longer in the running. They got absolutely buzzsawed by Florida State at home so they likely don’t even have a shot at an at-large bid.
http://hobnailboot.wordpress.com/
Not going to happen
(assuming no flukes and it is an undefeated or 1 loss UA, UF, LSU team etc), the winner of the SECCG game goes. Lose plays in the Sugar Bowl.
"Hollywood made a movie of my life. The film had me proposing to my wife on the football field. I would never misuse a football field that way." -Crazy Legs Hirsch
by Stuck in the Plains on Oct 8, 2009 6:06 PM EDT reply actions
I think you may have missed the point
UF would not have played in the game, a la UGA in 2007. And the only loss would have come on a botched call. At what point do voters begin to look at thinks like this, or do they ever. I think that’s the real underlying question here. Would they take into account, “okay UF is playing some of the best ball in the country and totally got hosed.. we would have loved to see them play bama in the SECCG but it didn’t’ happen, lets have them meet in the MNC” or do they say that a team who didn’t win its conf shouldn’t get to go? (and we know that’s not true) Or is a loss a loss? And they take the winner of another strong conference with only one loss, no matter how bad the defeat was or when it occurred in the season
by knowshon loves legos on Oct 10, 2009 9:56 AM EDT up reply actions
Impossible this season
Our schedule is too weak to make an argument like that.
I think it is impossible any year, but maybe if say Florida and Alabama both had murderous schedules, ran the table and played an epic battle in the SECCG, which was ultimately decided on a botched call. Even then, you would have to add in the element that the weaker team wins the championship in both the Big 12 CG and the ACC CG, plus, a 2 loss team wins both the Pac 10 and Big 10 based on tie-breakers. THEN, assuming everyone else has at least 1 loss (even bigger mid-majors), it could possibly happen. But I still think voters would try to make something else occur!
Oh....Only If...
Oh my, what if Kentucky had hit just one of those 500 field goal chances against Tennnessee in ’07!!! You know we would have drug LSU in Atlanta, and with the speed of our defense and the power we had on offense that year too…just makes me sick thinking about that National Championship we would have had!
But here is what everyone outside of our region fears…
A 64-team playoff.
-all teams eligiable for a bowl make the field (with a handful being weeded-out)
-USE the bowls for the playoff locations each week. (that way they keep their sponsors)
-1st round has 2 games at each bowl site, Friday and Saturday games w/ higher seed playing on Saturday
-1st round games are in the minor bowls (utilizing the bowl-site closest to each region)
-each round graduates to a larger bowl
-break teams down into North, East, South, and West regions
-start round 1 the week after the conference championships (just like 1-AA does)
-play the “Final Four” in the BCS bowls
-rotate the NC game between the current BCS bowls plus the Cotton to round it out
-crown a real National Champion
Here are the advantanges of this format…
-all bowls stay legit
-all bowls make money because they keep their sponsors, not to mention the revenue received from this type of draw!
-playing Friday and Saturday at each bowl in the 1st two rounds insures butts in the seats…except maybe for ACC teams (had to say it) because I know I’d go to the Fri night game if we played on Saturday
-whichever network got the rights to the games could name their price for the sponsors knowing 300 million Americans would watch this!
But the biggest fact of them all, which debunks the false excuse Presidents use…
-if started the week after the conference title games, the National Championship game would have been played a mere 4 days later than what it was played the past year anyway!!! I’m serious, break it down properly into brackets with the proper dates in December and January and you’ll see.
*I think it’s safe to say the midwest media doesn’t want it because 50 years from now SEC and Big12 schools would hold all the titles, proving that all of the NC titles their schools “won” prior to the 1960s were all hoaxes (especially considering how FEW they all have won since they began including our schools in the title consideration).
I do this every year using my EA Sports game at the end of the year. I let the games play on their own while I’m out, using no bias, etc. And using teams from the bowl list when it’s announced in the paper. I seed teams according to record and region, and play them on the bowl sites with random weather conditions for 15 minute quarters. I know it’s not scientific and leaves A LOT of room for error, but it’s intriguing to see some of the results.
Aren’t you currious as to how well media darlings like Boise State would do when they had to play real teams every week? You’d be amazed how often teams like Kentucky and USC could defeat Miami, Va Tech, and the like when they face-off. AND IT WOULD END 4 DAYS AFTER IT CURRENTLY ENDS!!!!
Think about it.
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