Florida State University’s win over Auburn University in the Bowl Championship Series on Jan. 6 marked the end of two college football traditions: one famed, the other hated.
Teams from the Southeastern Conference have won the BCS title game for the past seven years prior to this year, creating a status quo of sorts that SEC fans love and that fans of other conferences hate. Many fans attribute the SEC’s wins to its laser focus on football recruitment at the expense of academics. This trend is clearly represented in the list of Heisman Trophy award winners, with the SEC winning the second-most Heisman points of all time. The SEC’s championship run over the past seven years has, in the eyes of SEC fans, solidified the conference’s reputation as the most dominant in the nation.
The seven-year streak ended when Florida State, an ACC team, defeated Auburn, 34-31. Many college football fans hoped the streak would end in 2012 when a once-beaten Alabama faced an undefeated Notre Dame. But alas, it was not to be, as the Crimson Tide obliterated the Fighting Irish, 42-14.
Personally, I was overjoyed that a team was able to beat the SEC at its own game. The SEC is famous or infamous (depending on whom you support) for spending huge amounts of money to recruit the largest, fastest athletes. What Florida State showed throughout its undefeated season was that it was an SEC team in every aspect except for conference affiliation. Players racked up high scores in every game and the team boasted a promising quarterback backed by strong running backs and receivers. Florida State showed that the SEC is not the only conference that can play dominant football, and did so with gusto in the BCS title game.
Starting next college football season, the tradition of a single BCS title game will end. No longer will the system for determining a national champion pit the two top-ranked teams in a winner-take-all bowl game. The new system will select the top four ranked teams who will play in games similar to the semifinal and final rounds of a tournament, with the first seed playing the fourth seed and the second seed playing the third seed. No longer is it guaranteed that the two top-ranked teams will play in the national championship game.
I think that this change is for the better. The NCAA has been heavily criticized for the seemingly arbitrary way of deciding teams’ ranking following wins or losses. For example, in 2011, second-ranked Oregon University, lost to top-ranked Auburn in the BCS Championship. After Oregon’s loss in the BCS title game, their final ranking was third. Texas Christian University ended the season ranked second, despite having more losses and fewer wins than Oregon. This new system will provide stellar teams with minor blemishes on their record the possibility of winning a championship.
In all other organized sports, a ranking system is not used to determine who will play or what teams will play in the final matchup, so why has it taken college football so long to adjust?
These two “traditions” have both been hated, famed and criticized. Hopefully the end of the “SEC era” and the start of a new championship system will add to the delight that is college football.