BCS Rankings 2011 : SEC Is Set Up for Another National Championship Berth

There was little doubt that the SEC would have the top spot in the first edition of the BCS standings, but there's still plenty of debate regarding whether that top spot belongs to Alabama or LSU.

The rankings put LSU ahead of Alabama by the smallest of margin.

The computer rankings actually favored Alabama slightly more than LSU, but the human polls favored LSU more.

With these two teams on a collision course for their Nov. 5 meeting in Tuscalossa, it's almost a guarantee that the winner of this meeting will be in the BCS title game.

Alabama has a much easier schedule following their game with LSU, so if they're able to pull off the win then they'll be on cruise control to play for the national championship.

On the other hand, even if LSU does get by Alabama, they'll still have Arkansas to worry about in the season finale.

Arkansas still has an outside chance of representing the SEC in the BCS title game if they win out and Alabama loses to LSU.

Even if Alabama or LSU trip up somewhere along the way, there's still good odds that they could sneak in with one loss considering how far ahead they already are in the standings.

With the exception of Oklahoma, the rest of the field is well behind.

The real question is who Alabama or LSU would meet, and it's looking very likely that it will be the winner of Oklahoma and Oklahoma State game. They'll meet in the season finale with national championship implications most likely on the line.

With the way the schedule is naturally laid out, as of now we're looking at a final four bracket between Alabama, LSU, Oklahoma and Oklahoma State.

Boise State rounds out the top five of the initial BCS standings, but will unfortunately be left out of the national championship unless a major collapse happens to all four teams ahead of them.

It may not be fair that an undefeated Boise State will most likely be left on the outside looking in once again, but that's just the nature of the beast.

You still have an outside chance of Wisconsin or Clemson running the table and leap frogging an undefeated Boise State to sneak in.

This is no knock on Boise State, but there's no way they deserve to be ahead of Wisconsin with their only quality win coming against a Georgia team that just hasn't been what we expected it to be.

There's still a lot that obviously has to happen before any of us can confidently say who will end up with the top two spots, but it's clear that the SEC has the most clear-cut path with LSU and Alabama at the top.