The Meaty Lasagna: We know sports, we know food, we know life.

BCS Mayhem

It's that time of the year again.

Time for controversy. The BCS never fails to provide us with some great debate and controversy heading into the final stretch of the college football season, and this year is no different - with 2 undefeated teams currently sitting atop the BCS standings after Iowa's upset of Penn State last week. Four one-loss teams (Florida, Texas, Oklahoma, and USC) have a realistic shot of getting in if the cards fall right, and another undefeated non-BCS school (Utah) is looking to crash the party. As an avid Florida Gator fan, I'm worried about some of the scenarios that will play out in the next couple of weeks. I realize if the Gators take care of business the rest of the way - wins this weekend over South Carolina, a Citadel smackdown, a victorious venture to Tallahassee, and another SEC championship - the Gators will be well on the way to Miami to compete for a national title, probably against the Big 12 (South) champion. But what situation could derail this process, other than a loss of course. Imagine this: Texas, which is currently ahead of the Gators in every computer poll, wins their remaining games (the toughest coming this weekend @ Kansas) and does NOT get into the Big 12 championship game due to either Texas Tech running the table or an Oklahoma victory over Texas Tech.

What's that you say? Didn't Oklahoma lose to Texas? Yes, back in October in the Red River shootout, Texas took down the mighty Sooners. But if that scenario were to occur, Texas, Texas Tech, and Oklahoma would each have one loss in the conference, and each would have the tiebreaker against the other, meaning essentially nobody would have a head-to-head tiebreaker. At this point, the Big 12 goes to the BCS rankings, which all indicators show that Oklahoma would be the highest ranked team if it were to knock off Texas Tech next Saturday. This may not bode well for the USC's and Florida's of the world. An Oklahoma win against Tech and an eventual Big 12 Championship would lock in the Sooners to a BCS title game. You would think a victory in the SEC Championship would lock the Gators in as well, but what about Texas? Texas would still be sitting there with one loss, not having played in it's conference championship game. How will the computers look at this? Will a Florida victory over an undefeated Alabama team in the SEC Championship game be enough to vault the Gators over the Longhorns, or will the computers instead opt for a Red River rematch in Miami? It'll be interesting to see how it plays out - if you're a Gator fan like myself, let's just take care of business the rest of the way and see what happens.

Big Eisy, 11.14.08