Wednesday, January 03, 2007

Boise State's Slipper Still Fits . . .

What is there to add about one of the greatest games you or I have ever seen? Last year's Rose Bowl (which I only saw after the fact, as I was in Africa for the bowl season) was a truly great game, but the Fiesta Bowl, which pitted traditional power Oklahoma against upstart Boise State, best known to most casual fans as the team that plays on the blue "Smurf Turf," had the added benefit of presenting one of sport's favorite scenarios: The plucky underdog against the fearsome powerhouse; David versus Goliath; windshield versus bug. Because of this confluence of circumstances, Boise State won a game from which we will be seeing highlights until our alien overlords take control.


And yet a funny thing happened on the way to the coach turning into a pumpkin: Boise State did not play like an underdog. They did not play like a team filling their role in a script. They did not back down. And as a result they won the game, they won respect, and they changed the nature of the debate over how college football ends its season.


Let's forget for a minute the spectacular ending -- the perfectly executed hook and ladder, the pass from the non-quarterback (wide receiver Vinny Parretta), the decision to go for two when one would have continued the overtime, the modified Statue of Liberty play to score on the two-point attempt, that running back's (his name is Ian Johnson) proposal to the cheerleader (Chrissy Popadics) that almost assured that someone will make a movie out of the 2006-2007 Boise State football team. (If you insist on details you can and should read EDSBS's coverage here.)


The reality is that it was Oklahoma that had to muster a feverish, improbably comeback after Boise State came out and punched the Sooners in the mouth. Boise State was winning the game handily and in such a way that the final outcome, while wild, and while predicated on opening up a playbook, should make Boise State's head coach, Chris Petersen, the new crush for all AD's looking to fill coaching vacancies. Petersen thoroughly outcoached Bob Stoops, Oklahoma's erstwhile genius. And Boise State was simply better than Oklahoma on New Year's Day.


Back in November, after the Ohio State-Michigan game, I made the case for Boise State. I concluded my argument by writing:

Since the solons who control NCAA football do not care about legitimately deciding the championship on the field, I will continue to preach the virtues of Boise State, the people's national champion. A team that has done what Michigan, Florida, and USC could not do. A team that deserves a piece of Ohio State until we have a playoff system that gives every conference at least one berth in a tournament that decides the national championship where every other NCAA football division manages to establish these things -- on the field. Go Broncos!

Of course at the time, mine was a protest voice, an argument railing against a power structure that has proven both unjust and inflexible. But suddenly my argument, and that of thousands like me, does not seem so quixotic. There is no doubt in my mind now that whoever wins the "national title" will be a dubious champion. This will be especially true if Florida upsets the heavily favored Ohio State Buckeyes. Suffice it to say, I am jumping on the Gator bandwagon, hoping that the coach of the last non-BCS-conference team to win a BCS Bowl, Urban Myer, can validate his own ascent from it boy to savior, have-not to have, and in so doing, can cement Boise State's claim (with the help of AP voters) to at least a share of the most improbable national championship in the history of college sports.

4 comments:

g_rob said...

Best football game I've ever seen. Maybe best game, period.
'Remember Boise' is my team's new battle cry.

dcat said...

Yup -- Boise State just earned immortality. Even in the NCAA tournament (imagine, a tournament to end the season!) teams like George Mason end the season by losing. I am not quite so bold as to say that boise State would win a national tournament. But without sucha tournament, what else do we have to go on? The righteous opinions of sportswriters and pundits who weekly are wrong, without consequence, in their most ardent assertions?
Boise State will not pull anywhere near enough AP pollsters if Ohio State wins, but imagine if Florida wins, especially if it is a sloppy game?
"Remember Boise State" indeed.

dcat

dcat said...

GoodLib --
I can say that categorically, the AP will not vote a 2-loss USC team as national champion. let's keep in mind that Auburn got screwed in a year with three undefeated teams. The AP will either go along with the BCS game or it will, (not likely) go with Boise State. No way USC gets any #1 votes. If theydo, those voters should lose their right to vote.
dcat

dcat said...

Rich --
Boise State is a gerat example to use -- they went undefeated in a weaker conference but when they played major (BCS) conference teams, they won.
Here is the thing: There is only one way to know if one team is better than another in a postseason format: To have them play it out on the field. Strength of conference? That's fine. It is all well and good to know that the Big Ten is stronger than the WAC. So if you look back over the last ten years, the team from the strongest conference has won every national championship? Er, no. Hell, you mentioned the Ohio State game against Mimai -- by your logic, Ohio State was presumed to be weaker and so should not have been in the conversation. Miami should simply have been anointed champiopn. YTo hell with the games. they are a distraction from what we know in our hearts to be true.
Yes, in a tournament, Boise State would likly have gotten a low seed (I support a 16 team tournament in which conference champions get the first seeds and then everyone else gets what is left over -- if a conference does not desderve an equal shot at a berth and a seed, that conference should unilaterally be demoted to DIAA) but that does not matter. We do not have a tournament. And BSU finished its season by playing a major conference power that would have been in the national championship conversation were it not for awful officials in oregon.
I do not know what would happen ina tournament. Neither do you. The NCAA will not let us know. Until it does I do not see how anyone who cherished athletic competition can sit back and let coaches and journalists continue to anopint champions based on their infinite wisdom that is wrong every single week.

dcat