Looks like the year where a conference could have 3 teams in BCS

[jkjsooner]

So it looks somewhat likely that this could be the year where a conference (SEC) has three BCS teams.

All it really takes is for LSU to make the championship game and Georgia win it. (I think it would have to be LSU as Bama or Arkansas could not afford a second loss but LSU probably would get in with one loss.)


As a side point, I heard too many idiots claim that the SEC could get an at-large bid if Bama played LSU in the championship game. That's absolutely false. The only way to get three in is for all three to be automatic bids. I was listening to Jack Arute and Mike Leach. I can understand Arute having reading comprehension problems but not the law school grad Leach.

Let's see. The BCS has always given automatic births to the conference champion and to the #1 and #2. This contradicted with the two team limit. The rule makers agreed that the two BCS limit would not apply if there were three automatic births. They added a clarification in the rule but stated at the time that that was only a formality and they were going to allow three teams with or without this clarification.

Don't get how a law degree grad can't get it nor do I get how a Big 12 coach wouldn't have remembered that it was in fact the Big 12 who prompted the clarification.


Then again, Leach thinks we got blown out by LSU so obviously his memory is faulty.

[8timechamps]

Isn't there a rule that limits two teams from any conference? Seems like there was an issue with the SEC trying to lobby to change that rule.

[yermom]

i guess this might have changed at some point, like when they added another game, but i remember the rule being that if somehow the conference champion wasn't in the top 2, but #1 and #2 were in the championship game, the conference champ wouldn't be in the BCS

[yermom]

Jerry Palm lays it out well here:

http://www.collegebcs.com/bcsfaq.html#Eligible

[soonercastor]

three teams from the same conference can indeed play in the BCS, two must be in the MNC with neither having won the conference and the third being the conference champ.

[yermom]

so if the pigs beat LSU, Bama beats Allbarn and Georgia beats Arkansas, this could happen

although, i think LSU would have to be between Arkansas and Bama in the rankings the week of the CCG for that to happen with their head to head rules

[S.PadreIsl.Sooner]

Let's just get it over with and have the SEC only play each other then have a Championship Game to decide the MNC. All other conferences just play each other during the regular season and go to some tiddly-wink bowl.

It is obvious that the SEC is so superior that every other school is inconsequential.

[jkjsooner]

Jerry Palm lays it out well here:

http://www.collegebcs.com/bcsfaq.html#Eligible

I'm going to disagree with the following statement he had:


The old interpretation was that the champion would not participate to keep the two-team limit in place.


As I remember it in 2008 they stated that the new rule was simply a clarification. The rules led to a possible inconsistency where it was impossible to satisfy all rules simultaneously. They would have had no choice but to resolve the inconsistency and they stated that they would have allowed all three teams into the BCS. They stated this prior to the situation resolving itself and obviously prior to the formal written clarification.

Had this occured they would have been been stuck in a catch-22 situation where one rule guarantees the conference champion a BCS birth and another states that someone guaranteed can't go. Who's to say the conference champion would have been the one locked out? The rules stated "only 2" but it by no means prioritized one guaranteed spot over another.

The BCS guys were smart enough to come out ahead of time and avoid the potential issue which would have resulted in multi-million dollar lawsuits had the scenario played out with one of the three teams locked out despite their guarantee.


So, anyway, to make a long story short, 3 teams would have always been allowed in this scenario.


BTW, this all just points to how dumb the BCS guys are. They allowed a possible conflict that anyone who spent a few minutes to think about it would have spotted. The BCS formula is fairly complex and changes often. The rules about qualifiers isn't. There's absolutely no excuse for not thinking this scenario through ahead of time.

[jkjsooner]

Isn't there a rule that limits two teams from any conference? Seems like there was an issue with the SEC trying to lobby to change that rule.

That's what I tried to explain. There's an exclusion in the case #1 and #2 are from a BCS conference and neither won their conference title (meaning there would be a third automatic qualifier).

This has nothing to do with the SEC lobbying which was an effort to allow 3 teams with one or more of them at-large bids.

[badger]

Its a good thing that lsu proved itself by playing oregon early on, cuz the sec as a whole sucks if absolutely no team can challenge the top 3 unlike other conferences getting tested constantly like the big 12 and dare i say, even the big ten, the acc and the pac 12.

sec zzzzzzzzz. And here we thought they were sooooo strong top to bottom. I think lsu just scored on "rival" ole miss again lol