by Will Emaus

Created on: December 05, 2011   Last Updated: December 06, 2011

Why exactly can't there be a tournament to crown an NCAA National Champion?

This must be the base premise behind why we have the BCS system that we do. There must be a reason why there cannot be a tournament to actually crown the Champion. Never before 2011 has the flaw of this system manifested itself as blatantly as this particular season. First, let's examine why the current system doesn't work.

As a Michigan fan, I have spent the last 24 hours defending why the Wolverines are in a BCS bowl but the Michigan State Spartans are not. I can defend why Michigan is included, but I can't defend why Michigan State isn't. I know the reason why; because Michigan State made it to their conference championship and lost, and that loss drove them down in the rankings as losses will do.

However, Michigan didn't even make it to the conference championship. So by not playing an extra game, and teams that played in their conference championship losing, they were allowed to rise above the teams that played and lost and made it into the BCS.

That's wrong, and wrong things need to be addressed.

It's not the most wrong thing with the system however. Michigan will be playing Virginia Tech, who was destroyed in their conference championship game and in fact didn't beat any top teams all season, but they still got in. Other teams, not just Michigan State but deserving schools like Boise State and TCU, didn't make the BCS bowls either because they have smaller fan bases so they weren't selected.

But none of these teams are actually playing for the National Championship anyways. They are playing to win a bowl game and make substantial money. Which is nice I guess. But, the only two teams playing for the national championship, have already played each other. One won, and the other lost. So now, by playing each other again, you either have the undefeated number one team, LSU, proving that the team they already beat was legitimate thus crowning them the champions, or the team that lost the first time, Alabama, wins the next time and now you have a split. What makes this too much to swallow however, is a very legitimate third team, Oklahoma State, who didn't play either LSU or Alabama who isn't going to even have a chance to play for the title because computers and pollsters said so.

That may be OK for the 17th ranked team in the country, but it is not OK for the number 3 ranked team, who never got a chance to play either of the top two teams. This is now officially a mess.

So let's go

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