ACC Commish and the BCS

In a wholly expected move, the ACC commissioner came out in favor of the legality of the BCS. Here is a money quote:

"The BCS provided a platform for Utah to show the nation what a terrific football team they had this year." Swofford said. "Preceding the BCS, I don't know if that platform would have been there."

Without the BCS the Utes probably would have ended up playing in the Las Vegas Bowl against Arizona. This would have proven how good the Utes were much like the Utes' victory over Pittsburgh in the Fiesta bowl during their other undefeated season, which is to say not much. The commish goes on to say that conferences which receive automatic bids is up for review which conceivably could open the door for the Mountain West to receive an auto-bid. This would probably come at the cost of the automation bid for the ACC or the Big East.

Whatever happens, while the BCS doesn't give as elegant of a championship picture as a full tournament would, a playoff system wouldn't solve the problems. The NCAA mens basketball tournament is so popular, not because of it a playoff and because it provides a rational method for choosing a champion, but because there are so many games. Of the 63 games in the tournament only a few of them are memorable due to their exciting finishes. Proponents of the playoff system want to recreate the excitement of 63 games in 7 games, which isn't going to happen as there are invariably stinker games or blow outs. Further because their are so many teams included in the NCAA mens basketball tournament teams there aren't many teams that have a legitimate gripe about not getting in. An 8 team playoff wouldn't be able to achieve that as the hated methods for choosing the BCS teams would likely be used to select and seed the teams in a playoff.

Also because there are only 8 teams even more teams are marginalized and teams that had quality seasons are not rewarded in any sort of fashion under a proposed 8 team playoff for football. Thus the fans of teams that aren't elite (and the elite teams in college football have much more of a consolidated position than in mens basketball) would be left out of the playoff. Under an 8 team playoff teams most of the top 25 teams would be left out in the cold, this doesn't happen in basketball as virtually all of the #25 teams in the polls make the playoffs. Therefore the fans of those teams would be poorer served under a playoff system than the status quo of the bowls, unlike what some people say.