Do Non-BCS Teams Deserve a Shot at The National Championship?

BCS Busters are the new in thing in college football.

Lately, with all the BCS controversy, many wonder whether or not non-BCS schools should get a shot at the national championship. Well, lets take a deeper look and see if these teams truly deserve that ever-elusive crystal ball.

In 2004, Utah went 12-0 winning the Fiesta Bowl convincingly. But the Utes schedule was ranked 67th in the nation. That means that 66 other teams had tougher schedules than Utah.

USC and Oklahoma, who played each other in the National Championship, had schedules ranked at seventh and 13th respectively. In fact every other team in the top 25, except fellow non-BCS schools Boise State, Fresno State, and Louisville, had schedules ranked higher than Utah.

Finally, look at Utah's Bowl opponent, the Pitt Panthers, quite possibly the most undeserving BCS bowl team ever. Yes, Pitt won the Big East, but they finished the regular season 7-4 and only made the Fiesta Bowl because of a tiebreaker in the Big East.

So does Utah deserve a part of the 2004 NC? Not at all.

Now lets fast forward to 2006.

Boise State finished 13-0 with an exciting and stunning win against the Oklahoma Sooners. Again, strength of schedule comes into question.

Florida and Ohio State had schedules ranking eighth and 38th. Boise's was 90th. No one in the Top 25, except Hawaii, had weaker schedules.

In the Fiesta Bowl, Boise State played Big-12 Champion Oklahoma and beat them 43-42 in overtime. Oklahoma had two losses to ranked teams Oregon and Texas.

Looks like a good win for Boise State, but is it? Boise State let the game get away from them, Jared Zabranksy allowed OU's defense to take the lead with his interception, BSU needed not one but three trick plays to beat OU.

Boise State needed to do all of this to pull of a win against a team that ended up not even being the 10th best team in the nation. Now imagine if Boise State actually had to play in a BCS conference like the SEC or hell even the Big East.

So did Boise deserve a shot a the NC? Again, no.

2007 Hawaii goes undefeated in the regular season with a record-setting QB, Colt Brennan.

With the utter chaos of the 2007 season and no teams looking great, there is talk that, hey, Hawaii won all their games so they should be playing in the big game.

Do you seriously believe that with a schedule ranked 132nd in the nation that the Warriors deserved it? No again. Do I need to bring up the Sugar Bowl?

This past season Utah went undefeated, 13-0, and dominated SEC runner-up and previous No. 1 team Alabama 31-17.

Seems like Utah could be deserving, but are they? Utah had a schedule ranked 56th in the nation, better than previous BCS busters, but still not good enough to show that Utah would survive in a true BCS conference.

Defenders of Utah would say that Utah beat Michigan and Oregon State, who in turn beat USC, and they beat TCU, BYU, and of course Alabama.

Does this argument hold weight? I don't think so.

This argument is more of a media bias. Not in that non-BCS teams don't get respect, but that they gain advantages that BCS teams don't. Michigan finished their worst season in history, yet Utah is able to claim Michigan as a quality win.

Beating Oregon State does not guarantee that Utah would beat USC, just ask Penn State.

Again, it's a bias that even had TCU and BYU ranked in the first place.

Fans keep wanting to see BCS busters get in to the big game and that is what makes the media hype up average teams like BYU, ECU, and Fresno State this year. This, in turn gives Utah more quality wins they they actually had.

Non-BCS teams give college football fans another thing to be excited about. Some of the best bowl games have come from BCS busters, but the fact is that until these teams are able to get into a BCS conference or play a hugely tough out-of-conference schedule, these teams are just not deserving of getting into the big game.