BCS - Mandel Discusses Alternatives

Stewart Mandel of Sports Illustrated has a great article (Dec. 30, 2004) at SI.com on the endless controversy over BCS and college football bowl game matchups.

The article is entitled "So, you want an alternative?"

Mandel goes through various proposed alternative systems and shows the potential matchups under each system for this year.

All fine and good, if one agrees with those particular selections of teams.

But what if Boise State is the best team in the country?
What more can they do than win all of their regular season games?
But it is not included in any of Mandel's lists.

Four teams that Boise State beat during the regular season
Oregon State (53-34), UTEP (47-31), Fresno State (33-16) and Hawaii (69-3)

have already played in bowl games to close out this year:

Oregon State (who lost regular season to USC 28-20) beat Notre Dame 38-21
UTEP (who won regular season against Fresno State 24-21) barely lost to Colorado 33-28
Fresno State beat 18th-ranked Virginia 37-34
Hawaii beat UAB 59-40.

Makes Boise State look pretty good.
And makes any system other than a real playoff system involving all unbeaten teams, all conference champions, etc. a matter of opinion.