trashtalkr wrote:Hawaii went undefeated a couple years ago, but no one cares because they play shit teams! BSU doesn't play anyone tough, so who cares if they are undefeated? It doesn't matter when you play peewee football teams.
A 1 loss Pac-10 team is way better than an undefeated WAC team.
SOS and conference toughness should always be taken into account - not just on the last poll
This makes me chuckle...as BSU beat Oregon. So Oregon is now "no one tough" and a "peewee football team"...but you're asking for them to be above a team that beat them, head to head? They (BSU) only gave up 152 yards...when Oregon's star running back was still playing.
They've dominated every team they've played...including Oregon...but they're supposed to be ranked lower. They can't help what conference they play in, they can help how they do against the ranked teams they do play...and they're 1-0.
I just seriously cannot fathom why you're choosing to target BSU...when they've beaten Oregon. It would seem there are a lot of easier targets to pick on when trying to argue that your team is better than one ranked above it....then the one that beat them head to head.
And I mean the rest of the teams...
I'll assume you have no problem with Florida, Bama and Texas.
Iowa - they've been pretty damn lucky this season...but going undefeated thus far in the Big Ten is no easy task.
Cincy - aside from a good win over USF, they haven't really played a whole lot of talented teams...but that's not their fault. Louisville used to be good, the big east just ain't the best football conference around. They whooped on Oregon State (from your beloved pac 10) and have a ranked Pitt team and Illinois coming up. They'll be tested. You can't drop them in rankings before they get a chance...
TCU - They've beaten two ACC teams and crushed BYU (the only ranked team they've played thus far) don't know what else you really expect from them..
BSU- as we all know, they beat Oregon. Haven't played much of anyone else since...and won't the rest of the way.
What it all comes down to is reality.
BSU, TCU, and Cincy could all go undefeated and none of them will make it to the national championship, so I don't really see why you're complaining. The polls don't mean anything during the season...they're as useless as the preseason ones... Do you even understand how difficult a task it would be to change the rankings and base them EVERY SINGLE WEEK based on SOS and how hard the team they just played was? For a useless poll, that is WAY too much time and effort to go through every week. It is done at the end, and that's all that really matters...
As far as the actual scheduling goes. There is not a whole lot of wiggle room in college football for scheduling non-conference opponents. You generally only have a few weeks a year...at the beginning and end. Most of the big time schools in big time conferences schedule cup-cake warm up games...they're going to get respect and be ranked...so why not just pound some shitty D-II school to begin the season.
Then the end of the season comes around...and no big time team is going to subject themselves to possible defeat by a team like BSU and have their bowl chances ruined...so they finish it off easy as well.
The problem comes a lot of times from the OTHER side of the table. If you're a big time school...do you really want to risk throwing away your bowl chances by losing to the likes of BSU at the beginning of the season? Why not just go undefeated until conference and hope that the SOS will allow you a loss or two in conference?
In a perfect world, we'd get 1v2, 3v4, 4v5 all season long...because teams want to test themselves out of conference. But because of the way the BCS is set up...there just is no reward of playing "mid-major" teams like BSU and TCU...only the possibility of a huge loss if you lose. If you win? Well...you were supposed to win anyway, who cares?
So what you end up with, is teams scheduling games against middle-of-the-pack teams from power conferences and winning those, but still having it discredited. (for example, Cincy schdeuling a Pac-10 team and TCU playing two ACC teams) They're conference schedules are locked in...so you can't hold that against them...but you can see who they're trying to play when they can...and if they win those games...and beat everyone else...why punish them?
I mean just look at most of the big name teams and the first few weeks of their schedule....barring some exceptions...they're not trying to be tested too early.
Florida played a tough Charleston Southern and Troy before starting con. play. Texas opened up with Louisiana-Monroe.
I'm not going to say that programs like Florida and Texas are afraid to play teams like BSU, but why should they? They played ranked opponents every other week come conference time...they'll be tested....from that team's standpoint...what do they have to gain?
I give Oregon lots of credit for being willing to take on BSU at the beginning of the year....but if you lose that game, you gotta face the consequences....that is being a one-loss team when you could have gone the easy route in the first week and been undefeated right now... The final pollsters will look at that and give them their fair share of credit and hopefully tweak things around like they always do at the end....but as it stands right now....I can't see how you don't rank them lower.