I Never Played The Game

That title's pretty wistful and melancholy, eh? Well, it's also not mine.

Last Saturday night, while (oddly) getting constant text-updates from my lovely wife regarding Texas Tech's upset of Oklahoma^[1], I had a profound moment of clarity regarding The Only Championship in Collegiate Sports Not Explicitly Determined on the Field of Play Yet Strangely The Most Profitable Intercollegiate Athletic Event Apart From March Madness. And after today's events, I feel compelled to commit my predictions to (virtual) print, because goddammit, it's all coming true and I want some credit.

Here's the players in your National Championship in Collegiate Sports Not Explicitly Determined on the Field of Play Yet Strangely The Most Profitable Intercollegiate Athletic Event Apart From March Madness...

West Virginia vs. Ohio State for the title of Computer-approved National Champion. There. I said it. And here's how it's going to happen, all predicted by me last Saturday:

Arkansas beats LSU (and seriously, didn't everyone see this coming? They've spent a month pulling games out of their asses. They could no longer walk or poop normally.).


Missouri beats Kansas. So at this point Sunday night, your new BCS poll has Missouri #1, West Virginia #2, Ohio State #3, and (maybe) Kansas at #4, with Hawaii (too little, too late, and oh yeah, too little), Virginia Tech, or LSU at #5.

Then, during conference championship game week, Oklahoma puts Missouri back where it belongs, while LSU rebounds and plants Georgia in the SEC title game.

EDIT: Yeah, I now know that Georgia can't play in the SEC championship game now. But they also won't have a chance at a third loss either. They could wind up higher in the BCS than either LSU or Tennessee. And I love that.

And there you have it. West Virginia and Ohio State for all the subjective marbles, each in the right place at the right time and each with one unatractive loss (WVU's early to a soon-overrated South Florida, and Ohio State's late to a then-underrated Illinois). I'm not saying I agree with those probable rankings (Kansas losing to a team ranked directly below them at a neutral site would eliminate them from consideration because they didn't even play for a conference title?), but that's the way it shakes out under a non-playoff system.

And incidentally, I love the way Division I football ends its season, even under the BCS' semi-addled determinations. Barber shops, sports bars, old man bars, internet message boards, stupid blogs... all are made better by the sweet sound of debate and the arguing isn't lessened at all by the new-style rankings. Let the 2 a.m. barfights commence!

Check in a month from now and note how full of shit I am. Or to note how you wished you'd bet money on the West Virginia Mountaineers ^[2] to win the National Championship in Collegiate Sports Not Explicitly Determined on the Field of Play Yet Strangely The Most Profitable Intercollegiate Athletic Event Apart From March Madness the day after Thanksgiving.

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[1]My lovely wife cares little about sports in general. She cares about me, however, and at least acknowledges my love of football in any form. Even so, why she thought I gave a shit about some nearly meaningless Big 12 clash escapes me. I blame/praise ESPN's announcers (whoever the hell they were) for making the outcome of that game more significant than man landing on the moon, or cloning a sheep, or Britney Spears being barred from driving with her children in the car.

[2]In the interest of full disclosure, I was born in West Virginia, and did indeed live there the first six months of my life. However, I've never been an avid supporter of WVU athletics (even when they opposed hated Notre Dame for the title back in '88); I've been more of a Marshall man.