I think you are also forgetting that it could de-legitimize the AP if they start playing politics. It will make them irrelevant. It is very hard to say you are national champion the day after you lost the game. It is even more difficult for the AP to associate itself and its poll with the losing team.

The regular season is to determine who plays for this national championship game. That has been accomplished per the system we use. It sounds like sour grapes when you want to retroactively award championships. They didn't do it with Florida and FSU and nothing has really changed.

We've also played in the Capital One Bowl multiple times, whereas South Carolina hasn't ever played there before. Nebraska is a great name, and I would loved to have improved our record to 2-0 over the Cornhuskers, but we're getting the better, higher ranked team in Dallas. But leave it to folks in the media to pretend differently with their cliquish behavior.

If LSU soundly beats Bama, no one is going to say, "LSU just won both national championships." That would be pretty stupid wouldn't it. When anyone says Auburn was last year's national champion, they mean BCS champion. Last year no one, and I mean no one, ever said, "Auburn is the BCS and AP champion."

How the AP voted regarding Auburn last year was COMPLETELY MEANINGLESS. How the AP votes after this year's BCS game is also COMPLETELY MEANINGLESS.

Fan travel is always an issues. I spoke to several people in the Natural State in and around the UA program who said most fans wanted to go to Dallas, not Orlando. The folks in Orlando knew that.

If they thought HIGHER-RANKED Arkansas would have brought more fans than South Carolina, they'd have picked them.

And that's not a knock of any kind on Arkansas fans… though I'm sure it will be taken as one.

Thanks for reading the site,
John

The AP has given a national crown for decades. The BCS has been around for 14 years.

Were you so upset when they split the title in 2003?

John

More importantly, the fact that this is a rematch shouldn't hurt the team that lost the first time. It doesn't in the SEC championship game, the Super Bowl, or anywhere else in sports. It shouldn't matter here.

I'm not forgetting anything. I'm telling you how the system is set up. People call the BCS Championship Game the national title game, but it's not. It's only tied to the BCS trophy. The AP can agree or disagree with the BCS if it likes.

Anyone who wins the BCS does win a national title. It's the BCS national title. The AP still gives its own and that's how LSU and Southern Cal split the honors in 2003.

I'm not saying it's good or bad, right or wrong, I'm just telling you that if Bama beats LSU 9-6 in OT next month, Bama will win the BCS title by default and I think there's a good chance AP writers give the other crown to LSU.

John

What the hell does history have to do with how good a conference is in a current season? Just because a conference is the strongest one season, doesn't mean they are the best conference in every subsequent season.

So you're right in a way. The BCS isn't THE national championship game, but it is the ONLY national championship game. And if you really think it doesn't determine the national champion, try telling an Auburn player he didn't win the national championship game last year. See how far you get.

You seem to be missing one big fact — the BCS Championship Game is NOT the "national championship game." The BCS championship goes to the winner of that game. But the AP can — and it's done it before — award its own national championship to anyone it wishes.

There is no official national championship game in football. Grab the NCAA record book and you'll find that no "national champions" for football are ever mentioned.

John

LSU and Alabama are the two best teams in college football. The winner of their national championship game will be national champion. Anyone who suggests otherwise needs his head examined.

Good catch, I inititally wrote "A city's tourism board," then scrapped and rewrote the paragraph without changing city's to cities. My bad. The earlier or later I write, the more typos.

Thanks for reading,
John

Exactly!! Bowl games are simply high profile exhibition games created to generate tourist & TV dollars. I don't see how we can accept these conferences being blown up or reconfigured beyond recognition [& geographic logic] in the name of increased TV revenue & then complain about bowl match-ups created to fill up restaurants & hotel rooms. Unfortunately, these are revenue-driven decisions, not competition-driven decisions.