UABAlum

I don't think it's a scam nor do I think they, as a group, have an agenda. It's 12 different people with 12 different opinions with one stated goal: to rank the best teams. And apparently, best teams does not always mean most deserving teams. I dont think an undefeated Big 12 champ will get left out in favor of a one loss team even if it's Bama. The top B12 teams have played weak schedules so it's hard to determine how good they are . I mean, chances are that every top 25 team would be undefeated playing Baylor's schedule to date. But the ranked B12 are going to play each other and if any wins out undefeated, I think the winner will and should crack the top 4. Last year the B12 had no undefeated teams. I don't think it's a scam but regardless of what they call it, it's STILL a poll. It's just a poll of 12 hand picked people. I think they should have stayed with the BCS way of ranking and just expanded the number of teams to 4 or better yet, 8.

This question needs clarification. The top program over 50 years? Or the best team during the last 50 years (school and year)? Or an all-star team of the best players who played during the last 50 years? The best team in 50 years? You got me. The best of all time was probably 1945 Army. They had almost every real football player drafted into the army and beat #2 team 48-0. Best team of last 50 years is tough because of rule changes. Rule changes around 1980 pushed by TV made scores higher (and games less boring). Today's athletes are bigger, stronger and faster than before thanks to modern medicine (legal and not) so the best team could be a more recent team. The top 10 programs with the best winning percentage for the past 50 years is Nebraska, followed by Ohio State, Oklahoma, Penn State, Alabama, Michigan, Texas, Southern Cal, Florida, Florida State. The program with the most national championships over 50 years using the AP and Coaches Poll: (Coaches poll same as BCS in the BCS era; also, some years have split champions) 1st Alabama with 8 titles ('64, '65, '73, '78, '79, '92, '09, '11) 2nd USC with 7 titles ('62, '67, '72, '74, '78, '03, '04), 3rd Nebraska with 5 titles ('70, '71, '94, '95, '97) 3rd Miami with 5 titles ('83, '87, '89, '91, '01), 5th Notre Dame with 4 titles ('66, '73, '77, '88), 5th Oklahoma with 4 titles ('74, '75, '85, '00), 5th Texas with 4 titles ('63, '69, '70, '05) 8th Florida with 3 titles ('96, '06, '08) 9th Florida State with 2 titles ('93, '99) 9th Ohio State with 2 titles ('69, '02) 9th Penn State with 2 titles ('82, '86)

Your comments reflect my original opinion and it would be great for students and faculty. I love high school playoffs and the atmosphere it creates. As a Bama, I tried to envision that same situation with a packed 100,000+ stadium (home or away). But then I got to thinking, we're talking apples and oranges. What happens when this super game is played in a stadium that holds only 20,000 people or less in a small college town that does not have good travel access or sufficient hotels and motels? Where's the money then? You'd have to mortgage your home to buy a ticket. On-campus playoffs are great for high school games because the games are always in the same state. Even small schools and basket ball games can be on campus because of the limited number of fans that travel. But division 1 football poses issues that are not found in high school or even like the smaller football divisions because the number of division 1 fans and press that travel can be huge. The logistics are different. Even 50,000+ traveling fans and press can be beyond the means of some schools to host. That's a lot of airline tickets for some towns, a lot of hotel space for some towns, etc. If they had a 16 team field, I could see the first round or maybe the first two rounds at home. But I think a final four should be set at locations that can handle the crowds. And sadly, I don't think we will see anything more than a final four for at least 5 years.

Only two of the BCS top 4 going into the bowl season were conference champions. Neither Bama nor Stanford won their conference. Instead of Bama who lost to LSU by 3 in overtime, you get an Oklahoma State team who had not faced any team in the final top 10 and who lost to a weak team very late in the season. You also you get a 2-loss Oregon team who had already been drilled by LSU, and finally you get a Boise State team who lost to TCU and like Oklahoma State, had not faced a team in the final top 10. And that is better than a top-4 playoff.... why? Some people make a big deal about Bama not deserving a chance to play LSU for the title while completely ignoring the fact that the other teams deserved it even less. But if you still think Oklahoma State deserved it more, then that is fine because a top 4 playoff would have included them. I suspect most Bama fans would have rather had a top 4 playoff last year too. The end result probably would have been the same with far less hate. "If you are not the best in your conference, then you can't be the best in the country." Obviously true. But a conference champion is sometimes not always the the best team in its conference. No one who actually watched Bama/LSU play each other in their two games claims that LSU was the best team. The real problems with the conference-champion-only playoff are that some conferences can have co-champions - what then?, not every team plays in a conference, OOC games do count towards a conference championship, it penalizes teams for playing in the bigger, tougher conferences, and it rewards teams in weaker conferences for playing weak schedules because an undefeated season almost always guarantees a spot in the top 8. Nope. If you aren't the best team in your own division, let alone conference, how can you be the best team in the country? It's stupidly simple. Win your division. Win your conference. Win the playoff. If you can't do all those, you don't deserve it, period. You don't have polls, voters, or anyone to blame but yourselves. No politicking. No "best conference" circular logic. None of it. I would have loved to see Boise get in over Bama, and I don't even like Boise. Any system that doesn't put a priority on conference champs is inherently flawed due to human bias. Since that will never happen (SEC is already crying) the a top 3 champs +1 at large is the next best thing. So it was stupid simple that LSU was the best team in the SEC last year - gotcha.... You might have loved to see BSU get in over Bama, but that sounds like a personal bias because you won't find a single thread on BSU's board where they think they should have gone in over Bama.

Naw, I know of no SEC fans that hate Nebraska. You guys play like an SEC team - strong lines and strong on defense. I loved how you blew out that PAC 10 team last January. I don't think they had seen a real defense until their bowl game. Oregon got a taste of a good defense too when they faced Ohio State.

Well the tougher the conferences get, the tougher it is to win the conference undefeated. Can you imagine all of the major conferences beating each other up with no undefeated, and meanwhile two teams with cupcake schedules go undefeated? The best way to keep them from jumping you in the poll is to beat them. I wonder how much money BSU gets for playing their other OOC games.

1. Alabama - Perhaps the best Bama offense I've seen. They have serious talent on D too but that unit is still inexperienced. They should be solid by year's end. 2. Ohio State - Tough to rank OSU this high given their history but they sure look the part in every phase of the game. 3. Oregon - I normally rank great defenses over great offenses and TCU has a better defense than Oregon - but right now I would have to bet on Oregon if they played today so that's how I am ranking them. 4. TCU - great team - especially defensively. 5. Nebraska - I think I had better expectations than the corn husker nation. You guys looked great last January - glad to see things have not let off. 6. Texas - great defensive coaches and as much talent as any team in the nation. 7. BSU - was not impressed with them against a very rough, inexperienced VT team. BSU did better today against weaker competition but BSU had an extra week to prepare and appear to be going for style points. 8. Oklahoma - would have had these guys 7th except for their close game against Airforce. They looked good against an FSU team that whipped BYU. 9. Arkansas - with one of the nation's best QB/Reciever Corps combos and a defense that's improved a lot, this team looks as good as most teams in the top 10 - and might be as high as 7th or 6th. 10. Florida - Florida's coaches like an offensive style that doesn't match their player's abilities. But Florida seems to be starting to wake up from their post Tebow funk. .

GREAT point! But no one ever looks at it that way. Also, how would everybody feel if Nebraska had one loss this year (let's say to Texas A&M) but won the Big 12 title. Would people be O.K. with an undefeated Boise State jumping us to play in the MNC game? For all the people defending Boise State....I'd like you all to look at the bold statement above and then answer. Try this scenerio. How about Ohio State is undefeated and Alabama loses one game in the regular season but wins the SEC Championship against a Florida team thats ranked in the top 10 but Boise State is undefeated. Who should play Ohio State in the MNC game? Depends which game Alabama lost to. And if NU lost one game and BSU wins out, then Id say give it to BSU. Everybody can sit and whine/moan about how BSU does not play a hard schedule except almost everytime they have come out and played a top 10 team, they win. Can we say that? Not unless we go about 10-15 years back. Can you say 100% BSU would lose 2+ games a year if they played in the big 12 or any other big conference? Nope, you can't. It's amazing the kind of complaining that goes on about BSU when they have actually stepped up and beat the teams that we need to but can't. Give me a break people. The way you guys played in your bowl game, you would have beaten BSU last January. BSU beat TCU, who beat????? Utah and Clemson? Utah had lost their assistant coaches and TCU struggled against Clemson. TCU had the 60th toughest schedule in the nation and BSU had the 96th toughest schedule - and that is when you include their game against TCU. But I think Virginia Tech's loss to a no-name school today may have put this topic to rest.

The PAC10 fans like offenses and don't respect good defenses from other conferences. When they see stats from defenses like Nebraska, Texas, TCU, Alabama or Florida, they assume its because those teams played weak offenses. Oregon fans expect to score no less than 45 points on Ohio State. Nebraska looked good enough to be playing in the title game.

USC lost more than their defense to graduation. They lost key assistant coaches too. It was the combination of those two that resulted in an off year. Ohio State gave that game away when they lost to USC. Nebraska would have won had they played USC. It might not have been a 33-0 blowout but you guys would have taken them. I joined this board after watching the Nebraska/Missouri game. As an SEC fan, I love great defenses and you guys have a great one. Nebraska looks like the Nebraska of old. I checked on some PAC10 boards and read how posters had to eat crow - about how the PAC10 was the strongest conference and how the Big 12 and SEC were overrated... I expect Oklahoma to beat Standford so the PAC10 should go no better than 3-4 in bowl games (with 2 of the 3 wins against bad teams).

I have to say, Missouri's defense looked a lot better tonight than they did against Nevada. After watching Nebraska play VT and watching Missouri play Nevada, I didn't expect this game to be so close. I thought Nebraska would just run right over Missouri. But Missouri's D hung tough.

It was a missed call. Ref made an assumption and he was wrong. They are only supposed to throw those flags when they see the foul...

A come from behind win is always good, but coming from 0-12 to 27-12 against a ranked team in the 4th quarter is more impressive. Nebraska's only loss is to the 5th ranked team in the nation and that was a game Nebraska nearly won. I was stunned last week when Miami's victory pushed up Virginia Tech but didn't help Nebraska. After all, Nebraska played VT a whole lot better than Miami did. I figure now lower than 15 and could go higher, especially if other teams lose. What do you think?

I have to agree. I saw you guys run on Virginia Tech so I knew you could run on Missouri.

Looked like he hid the injury until after he scored - real guts.

Well, Bama has to beat the other teams in the SEC West or they won't play Florida. Tomorrow could be a danger. Ole Miss has looked bad so far this year but that is the same team that exploded down the stretch last year - missing only their FB, one OL, one DL and a linebacker from last year's team. They started out rough last year too - were 2-2 when they finally woke up and knocked off Florida. Their coach is best as a motivator when they are the underdog. But if Bama makes it through the west w.o a loss, they might take Florida in the SECCG. I don't think LSU can shut up ESPN - even if LSU wins. If LSU wins, ESPN will blame Teebow's injury. But I don't think LSU will win.

Wow - watching that game, it was obvious that the best team won. So if they are sorry, what would that make Missouri? If anything, Nebraska is underrated. And this is from an impartial observer.

Congrats on a great win from a Bama fan. Nebraska is improved this year over last year and, IMO, Nebraska underrated. My only surprise was that your team waited until the fourth quarter to really wake up. But Nebraska's lines were better than Missouri's on both sides of the ball - and I knew that before tonight (which is why I picked you guys in a local pick'em contest). Now, as for this post - was it just me or were some of those refs blind as a bat - especially when it came to spotting the ball. I was using instant replay on a 50" digital TV over and over and I could not get over how bad the refs spotted the ball at times. I swear they gave Missouri's a first down with a bad spot and that last long run by Nebraska was brought back 6 feet. The RB was tacked at the 3 yard line and the ball was spotted on the 5. I could see spotting it at the 3.5 yard line - but the FIVE? The ref was only a few yards away and watching the whole thing. And I ran it over and over on replay to see how he could be so far off. It drove me nuts because the ref was RIGHT THERE. The spots in the 4th quarter were frequently bad and they seemed to hurt Nebraska a lot more than Mizzo - although that could be unintentional. I didn't have a dog in that fight but it bothered me enough to find this site and register just to ask if any of you guys noticed that. Anway - good to see Nebraska winning again.