More BCS madness, brought to you by Bob Stoops

No NFL picks this week, cause who can think about the pros when there is so much buzz around college football right now?!?!? (Also, I'm lazy).

Tonight, Oklahoma won against Texas Tech. By a lot. "Won" isn't a strong enough word. It was a butt whipping wrapped in beatdown and topped off with a double helping of ass-stomping. The Sooners prevailed 65-21, and it could have been worse.

Oh boy.

As a result of this rather convincing victory, their will be thousands of hours of mental masturbation from coast to coast as fans, pundits and voters try to figure out just who should win the Big-12 South. The implications are huge, since the winner of the Big-12 South need only win the Big-12 championship game to be wisked away to the BCS championship game in Miami. And since the NCAA has yet to hear my pleadings and abolish the national championship altogether, this is a big deal.

The problem is that, assuming Oklahoma wins next week against Oklahoma State, their will be a 3 way tie for first place in the division. Each team be 1-1 against the other two and have an identical record otherwise, so the tiebreaker is whatever team has the highest BCS rating. We can pretty much assume that Tech is out, as they will likely be punished badly for tonight's suckitude, so the question is simple: Texas or Oklahoma?

Keep in mind that Texas beat Oklahoma by 10 points on a neutral field. So it seems pretty obvious to me who should go. But this is the BCS, meaning nothing is obvious, especially that which should be obvious. Oklahoma is going to get major points in the minds of the voters, who are fickle and short of attention span, because of tonight's dominating performance. They'll probably get some more love if they get a big win next week against State. So it could very well be the case that even when Mac Brown manages to beat Bob Stoops he still is his bitch.

Of course, if State manages to beat Oklahoma next week, then Texas Tech, who just got rocked 65 ways from Sunday, is your Big-12 South Champion. If I were a Texas fan I'm not sure what would piss me off more: beating Oklahoma but getting screwed out of a Big-12 championship by voters, or going 11-1 with a single, last second road loss but being screwed out of a Big-12 championship because your hated arch rival lost. This next week is going to suck for them, because they have to root for Oklahoma to win, but at the same time they need Oklahoma to suck badly while doing it or else risk getting edged out because of "style points". Its a real no win-situation for the Horns faithful.

While I can accept all this hemming and hawing over the Texas vs. Oklahoma question, I just about lose it when people ask stupid questions like "will Oklahoma jump Texas AND Florida"? Earth to poll obsessed idiots: IT DOESN'T MATTER! This is the easiest thing in the world to figure out, because Florida is in a different freaking conference and its not going to be a question of Texas/Oklahoma OR Florida in the National Title game. Florida controls its own destiny. In a rational world we could drop them from the rankings and it wouldn't matter as long as they win out. But again, this is College Football, and there has never been an ABC promo that said "Rationality Lives Here".

The Pac-10 would be in a prime position to crash the party with an entrant of its own in the person of the USC Trojans. That is, if OSU would be so kind as to lose their final game to Oregon. OSU almost lost to Arizona tonight because of a missed extra point but managed to pull out a miracle with less than a minute remaining and stole a 19-17 victory over Mike Stoops. I can only imagine what Thanksgiving is gonna be like at the Stoops' this year, with Mike blowing yet another close game at home while his brother has perhaps the hottest team in the country.

Now, assuming USC wins out and wins out big (an easy assumption), and OSU loses next week (a not so easy assumption), I believe USC path to the title game is narrow but possible. Several scenarios come to mind:

1) Oklahoma State beats the Sooners next week

Could happen. Maybe. Alright, probably not, but if it did you would have Texas Tech as your Big-12 South Champion, and then frankly it wouldn't matter if they or Mizzou won in Kansas City. I think the stink of failure from tonight's nightmare would be too strong for Tech to overcome, and SC would probably be voted in over them to play the winner of the SECCG.

2) OK or Texas goes to Kansas City and Mizzou pulls the upset.

All but guarantees an SC title game bid. The only way it doesn't happen is if PSU jumps USC (unlikely) or if whoever doesn't make it from the Big 12 South gets in despite finishing 2nd in their division. This has happened before in the BCS and frankly it pissed a lot of people off, which I why I don't think it will happen again.

3) Florida loses to State and then beats Bama

1 Loss USC > 2 loss SEC Champion

4) Bama loses the Iron Bowl but squeaks out an unconvincing SECCG win.

Now we're really getting weird here. Basically the argument is that Bama tarnishes itself so badly that SC could jump them, but I really don't see it happening.

By the way, all of these USC situations also could apply to Penn State, assuming either an SC loss or an Oregon State victory, though Penn State has the problem that it is the Champion of the Big-10 and therefore has to deal with the unfortunate BCS baggage which Ohio State has accumulated over the past 2 years.

It will be interesting to see if an at-large Pac-10 Co-champ USC would be voted in over Penn State. And by "interesting", I mean lots of people would be really, really mad no matter what happened. You know what would be really interesting? A playoff.

The funny thing is that there could be at least two undefeated non-BCS schools who aren't even in this conversation. Utah is 12-0 and poised to crash the BCS party, and Boise State is a win away from a 12-0 record of its own (not to mention *ahem* the Ball State Cardinals, but we aren't going there). Depending how things play out, you could very likely have two undefeated top 10 teams who won't even be considered for the BCS NCG while two one-loss teams get in. All the more reason we either need a playoff or to create a new division between BCS and non-BCS schools, because frankly its bullshit that over half of division 1-A schools have zero chance of winning their supposed National Championship.