What The Heck is The BCS?
Darlings, Let's get down to the basics of NCAA football... The BCS
System. Hated, Loved, and Absolutely loathed, this computerized method
of ranking football teams has been the center of much controversy. But
what is it, and how does it work? How is it that there are teams who
have gone un-beaten all season are ranked lower then those who've lost
once, even twice? It's called The BCS, Dear Girls... let's break it
down.

The BCS was formed in 1998 after The Rose Bowl (which was
traditionally a Pac-10/Big 10 match up) agreed to release their
conference agreement in order to properly create a National
Championship Game. In return, The Rose Bowl was added to the elite BCS
bowl schedule.

The BCS stands for BOWL CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES. In truth, it's designed
so that the top two teams in NCAA football are properly chosen to play
one another in the "National Championship Game." NCAA football does
not have a traditional playoff series, rather it relies on The BCS to
fairly rank teams based on a combination of polls (an average from
both AP and ESPN polls), strength of schedule, and win-loss.
Basically, it's a statistical mathematics problem, that even the
smartest scientist can't properly dissect.

In addition to choosing the two teams to play in the National
Championship Game, The BCS rankings selects top teams to play one
another in a series of six elite bowl games. Ten teams are selected to
play in BCS Level Bowls. Six teams must come from "BCS
Conferences" (will explain below) plus four other teams that don't
have to be BCS conference teams.

So what's the problem? Critics complain that it's an unfair method.
Rather then a true competition on the field, the BCS rankings are
chosen via computers and what some say are "quite bias" polls. Even
President Obama expressed his dislike for the system in an interview
on 60 Minutes last year...
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE BCS:
- BCS Bowls are the following: Rose Bowl Presented by AT&T, Nokia
Sugar Bowl, Tostitos Fiesta Bowl, Fed Ex Orange Bowl
- The National Championship location changed per year. This year it
will be held at The Rose Bowl
- BCS Conferences are the following: Big 12, ACC, Big Ten, Big East,
SEC, Pac-10
- The highest ranked champion of a Non-BCS Conference (i.e. a
conference different then the ones listed above) must be ranked in the
top 12 or ranked higher then at least one BCS Conference Champion.
- Only one Non-BCS Conference team is permitted to play in a BCS Bowl
Game, the only special cause is Notre Dame who is independent of all
conferences.
- Only two teams at most from any one conference can go to a BCS game
- BCS Bowl games will be chosen Sunday, December 6, 2009 after all
teams have finished their regular season

Now, when your boyfriend or husband complains about their teams not
being properly ranked... you'll know who they have to blame... it's
that darned old BCS!