Mountain West Conference Files Request for BCS Automatic Qualifier Status

The Mountain West Conference has filed an official request to be a BCS automatic qualifier for the 2012 and 2013 seasons.

The conference has a 50-46 record this season, thanks to TCU and Boise State.

With both of these schools leaving for BCS automatic qualifying conferences, the conference is left with teams posting a 29-43 record in 2011.

How can anyone think that record deserves an automatic qualifying spot in the BCS?

It’s bad enough that No. 23 West Virginia is in a BCS bowl with a 9-3 record, while No. 7 Arkansas gets left out with a 10-2 record and its two losses came at the hands of the No. 1 and No. 2 teams in the nation.

Allowing a conference that is unlikely to have a ranked team within it to have an automatic spot in a BCS bowl would be absurd.

The BCS is without a doubt a terrible system already.  Let’s not make it worse by filling the BCS bowl games with automatic qualifiers that don’t deserve to be there.

Think people are upset now with West Virginia getting into the BCS? Wait until unranked, Colorado State wins the MWC with a 7-5 record and gets in.

Here is a novel idea.  Rank the teams with your ridiculous formulas and biased coaches’ votes.  Put the Top Two in the national championship and let the next eight play each other in the four remaining BCS bowl games. 

Does that make too much sense, or make things too simple? What sense does it make to have automatic qualifiers? 

All it does is put less deserving teams in BCS bowls because they play in weaker conferences.

If you’re in a weaker conference, schedule out-of-conference games against ranked opponents and earn the respect of voters.   

Winning games against ranked opponents more than proves you've earned your spot in a BCS bowl game. 

Stop looking for handouts.