BCS Week 10 Report: Is LSU the Best Team in the Country?

LSU has issues with its quarterback rotation of Jordan Jefferson and Jarrett Lee. Their coach Les Miles does not inspire confidence outside of his own locker room. I mean, the guy has "les" twice in his name, for crying out loud.

The Tigers did lose to Auburn, and they will not to play them again this year in the SEC Championship Game.

What LSU did do was beat what I thought was one of the best teams in the country in Alabama. It comes down to quarterback play, and the matchup of Jefferson and Lee versus Greg McElroy is not as lopsided as the matchup advantage Auburn had with Cam Newton.

LSU is the only one-loss team with a chance now to crack the top two. The Auburn-Alabama game is now only huge for the Tigers. Oregon looks unbeatable at this point. The Ducks had a "bad" game against Washington and still put up 53 points.

Oregon has two tough games left: Arizona at home and Oregon State on the road. They are firmly in control of their own destiny.

With that being the case, Stanford looks like they are in control of their own destiny for a Rose Bowl berth after they soundly beat the Arizona Wildcats. Jim Harbaugh has proved to be a great hire by the Cardinal, and his development of Andrew Luck has made Luck a solid NFL prospect.

There is still the Big Game with Cal on the schedule, and all of the rivalry games can be potential upsets.

Who Stanford could play in the Rose Bowl is still to be determined. Michigan State beat Wisconsin, Wisconsin beat Ohio State and Iowa, Iowa beat Michigan State and Iowa and Ohio State still have to play.

What a year for the Buckeyes and Spartans to not play each other.

Sticking with the Big Ten for a moment, the final tally of the Michigan-Illinois game looked like a basketball score. The Rich Rodriguez experiment has not been as smooth as the Jim Harbaugh experiment at Stanford, but the Wolverines are once again bowl eligible after two down years.

TCU ran all over Utah in its last big test. It was not enough to jump them over Auburn, so the writing is on the wall for the Horned Frogs. They will need a loss by Oregon or Auburn to get into the top two.

Boise State also demolished its opponent, Hawaii, and it did little for them. They do have a big game left against Nevada, but they will need a lot of help to get into the top two. An Oregon State win over Oregon would be a double win for the Broncos.

So as the regular season tournament winds down, some of the stuff was decided on the field. Auburn and LSU met in a playoff game, and Auburn won it. Oregon, TCU and Boise State did not have a playoff game this year. Those three teams lined up against the teams against them and took care of their business.

LSU might be the best team in the country, but the gap between them and No. 4 Boise State is too large to jump.

Four teams have put themselves ahead of the field in college football this year, and if they all win out, then we will just have to scratch our heads as we wonder why the BCS leaves its process up to a regular season playoff where all of the teams do not play each other.

List Time

My Top Two

1. Boise State

2. TCU

Conference Power Rankings

1. SEC

2. Pac-10

3. Big Ten

4. Mountain West

5. Big 12

6. WAC

Week 11 Preview

1. Oregon at Cal

2. Georgia at Auburn

3. San Diego State at TCU

4. Boise State at Idaho

5. South Carolina at Florida

One Last Thought...

Cam Newton can outrun all kinds of defenders, but he has not been able to outrun his past. Allegations of pay-for-play as well as alleged academic fraud have come to the surface.

Newton is the best player in college football this year, but he also cannot outrun the Reggie Bush scandal. Do Heisman voters really want to give the trophy to a player who, like Bush, has earned it only to see it vacated a few years later?

And does Auburn want to suspend its All-American-to-be quarterback while this mess gets sorted out?

It looks like the answer might be no to both of those tough questions. The other tough question is this:

Does an NFL franchise want to put its future in the hands of a kid that has shown a penchant for making bad choices?