BCS Announces Rule Changes for 2008-2009 Season

LAS VEGAS, NV – In a series of special meetings held last weekend at the Venetian Resort Hotel Casino, conference commissioners, university athletic directors, and BCS officials agreed to amend college football's controversial bowl game rankings criteria. 

Spurred by increasing public furor over BCS bowl selections, most participants felt the meetings were a productive step in satisfying the system's real winners: the commissioners, universities, and BCS officials themselves.

One commissioner, who asked to remain anonymous, said, "The meetings could have gone one of two ways: One, create a fair system that would get the two best teams to the championship game nine out of ten seasons; or two, keep heading in the direction of the most nonsensical, arcane system possible. 

"We've achieved number two this weekend."

A press release from the BCS committee after the meetings stated, in part:

The Coaches Poll, Harris Poll, and Computer rankings will no longer comprise one-third of the BCS standings each.  The Coaches poll will now represent only thirteen percent of the standings.

The remaining twenty percent of the standings will be determined by the new BCS Cheerleader Bikini Championships—presented by Coppertone!  This annual contest will be broadcast on ESPN2, and feature the cheerleading squads of the top fifty Football Bowl Subdivision teams, as ranked by the season's initial Harris poll.

This event will be held the weekend prior to the release of the initial BCS rankings, and scores earned in the BCS CBC will remain a fixed component of BCS rankings throughout the season.

A source close to Big Ten commissioner Jim Delaney responded to the news:

"Oh, it was all Jim's idea.  He saw that BCS conference commissioners were leaving untold millions on the table that could be gained in additional advertising and sponsorship revenues for this event, not to mention calendar sales."

Reaction to the news was mixed across the country. 

Tommy Ferguson, standing outside the Phi Kappa Psi house at the University of Georgia, commented between swigs of Busch Light.

"Sweet, brah!  Everybody knows the SEC's got two things: the best football and the hottest chicks," he said. 

"And UGA's got the hottest!  Now we're finally gonna have a real shot to get to the championship game after all these years of 'not quite.'  How 'bout them Dawgs!"

Other fans had less positive opinions of the new criteria.  A visibly agitated Jeremy Hornsbrook spoke while standing on a sidewalk near Colorado University.

"This is bull----.  First, that whole female kicker on the team thing a few years ago made us a laughingstock.  Then, Colt Brennan transfers to Hawaii and throws about 400 career touchdowns. 

"If this is bad karma for the Fifth Down, Georgia Tech can have the consensus '90 championship.  We might as well send Ralphie IV and her Handling Squad," Hornsbrook lamented, referring to CU's buffalo mascot.  "Our cheerleaders suck."

Although university officials could not be immediately reached for comment, Brigham Young University is expected to boycott the event.