Is BCS Using a High-Tech System?

We’ve been tracking the Hurricane Hokie story the way those guys do on the Weather Channel.

A lot of so-called national title contenders start off as amorphous forms, relative thunder bursts off the African coast, and amount to nothing.

That’s how we had sized up Virginia Tech; a tropical depression, at worst.

In a contender, we title trackers look for organization, wall formation, momentum, speed and direction.

But, hey, even the experts blow it.

Hurricane Hokie made landfall Saturday in the form of a 62-0 wipeout of Syracuse in Blacksburg, Va., and appears to be cutting a swath toward the Jan. 4 Sugar Bowl in New Orleans.

It could happen.

How? How? How?

How can a school from the nation’s sixth-best major conference, the Big East, position itself for a national title run with a nonconference schedule that includes wins over James Madison, a Division I-AA opponent, and Alabama Birmingham?

“We don’t think we have anything in terms of strength of our schedule to apologize for,” Virginia Tech Athletic Director Jim Weaver said this week from his office in Blacksburg.

Who could argue? Kansas State made a title run last year using the same strategy.

Once, it was thought you had to play a national schedule to win a national title. Notre Dame this year booked Tennessee, Michigan, Michigan State, USC and Purdue.

Why? Because Notre Dame is in the banner business.

Every year, Florida State plays nonconference games against Florida and Miami.

Silly Seminoles.

Notre Dame got ejector-seated from the polls after a 1-3 start this year, and Florida State Coach Bobby Bowden, who turns 70 next month, has yet to post an unbeaten season.

Why is schedule strength a great play when you can get there doing the Hokie Pokey?

At 6-0, the Hokies rank No. 4 this week in both the writers’ and coaches’ polls with a good chance to move up.

The schools ranking ahead of Virginia Tech--Florida State, Penn State and Nebraska--in the next few weeks face perilous games against current top-10 teams: Florida State plays No. 6 Florida, Penn State plays No. 9 Michigan, and Nebraska plays No. 7 Kansas State.

Virginia Tech has not defeated a team currently ranked in the top 25 and gets its toughest remaining opponent, 2-3 Miami, at home.

It’s conceivable the Hokies could finish 11-0 and get their first serious test in the Sugar Bowl--winner take all.

In the computer component the bowl championship series uses, Virginia Tech ranks first this week with a 1.285 average (the BCS throws out the worst of the eight rankings and divides by seven), followed by Nebraska at 1.857, Florida State at 2.714, Kansas State at 4.428 and Penn State at 5.142.

Virginia Tech, as poll pal Kansas State did a year ago, has chosen the title path of least resistance.

Weaver acknowledges he set up a soft 1999 schedule with the idea the Hokies would be breaking in a freshman quarterback. When he took the job in 1997, Weaver added Clemson and James Madison. Virginia, a traditional rival, and Alabama Birmingham were already booked.

“We didn’t know the quarterback was going to be Michael Vick,” he said.

Vick, the Hokies’ redshirt freshman, may be good enough to win the Heisman Trophy as a sophomore.

Virginia Tech is also catching all the breaks. It beat a Virginia team depleted on defense and goes to West Virginia on Nov. 6 in a year the Mountaineers have played like Mutineers.

Virginia Tech is playing a calculated game against the BCS computer and, for the moment, winning.

The first BCS standings will be released next Monday, but you don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows. The Hokies, with an off week, are going to score at or near the top in three of the four BCS categories: polls, computer and losses.

All eyes will be fixed on the fourth component: strength of schedule. Virginia Tech will get hit hard here; how hard is the question.

In the end, an 11-0 Hokie team might still get left out of the Sugar Bowl because of Weaver’s decision to play James Madison.

“If that’s the case, that’s what happens,” Weaver said. “We’ve got to live with where we are, and live with who we are. And live with the league. And we make no apologies for any of those things.

“We just don’t.”

There was no BCS formula to consider when Weaver booked James Madison, but he says it would not have mattered.

“We wouldn’t do anything differently,” he said. “We’re not going to second-guess the situation relative to all the hoopla going on.”

Virginia Tech and Kansas State have different agendas on the national stage, and that’s fine.

But if one of the two BCS spots goes to one-loss Tennessee, that only loss against Florida at the Swamp, instead of 11-0 Virginia Tech, the Hokies can spare us a “We-was-robbed!” campaign.

Virginia Tech sure looks like a great team, but if I’m John Q. Public, I want to kick the tires before I drive it off the lot and turn wheels toward the Louisiana Superdome.

Historical note: In the 1993 season, unbeaten West Virginia raised a ruckus about being left out of what amounted to the national title game, hooted and hollered all the way to the Sugar Bowl and got clobbered by Florida, 41-7.

BOWL BANTER

Hard to believe things could get much worse for the Pacific 10, but chew on this:

There’s a chance Stanford could win the conference title at 5-3 but not be bowl eligible.

The Cardinal is 4-0 in Pac-10 play, 4-2 overall, facing a tough road stretch at USC, Washington and Arizona State. Let’s say Stanford gets swept, then recovers to beat Cal at home on Nov. 20. That would leave the Cardinal at 5-5 overall with a Nov. 27 home game remaining against Notre Dame.

A loss to the Irish would leave Stanford without the six wins required for bowl participation.

In that case, which Pac-10 school goes to the Rose Bowl?

Stanford.

The Pac-10 champion is contracted to play in the Rose, although Stanford would have to formally petition the NCAA management council to waive the six-win requirement.

There’s a decent chance Stanford would get the waiver.

By chance, the NCAA management council’s chairman this year is Ted Leland.

Leland?

He’s the athletic director at . . . Stanford.

A BAD YEAR PAC-THEN

Kids today may not recall the Pac-10 ever being this dreadful, but it was worse in 1983.

The Pac-10 finished 16-19-1 against nonconference foes that year. At 6-4-1, UCLA was and remains the school with the worst record to represent the Pac-10 in the Rose Bowl, although that dubious distinction is certainly up for grabs.

This year, the Pac-10 is 15-14 against Division I-A nonconference opponents, 0-7 against ranked teams. Good news: With only three out-of-conference dates remaining--USC vs. Louisiana Tech, Stanford vs. Notre Dame and Washington State vs. Hawaii--the 1983 record for losses is safe.

Other similarities: In 1999 and 1983, the Pac-10 had scheduling quirks in which its teams got pounded on the road against quality opponents.

In ‘83, UCLA was crushed at Nebraska, 42-10; Washington lost at Louisiana State, 40-14; USC lost at Notre Dame, 27-6, and Oregon lost at Ohio State, 31-6.

In ‘99, Pac-10 schools have limped away with losses at Penn State, Ohio State, Michigan State, Texas and Notre Dame.

“We hope this is an aberration, not a trend,” Pac-10 spokesman Jim Muldoon said this week.

Is there reason for optimism?

Yes.

In 1984, the Pac-10 rebounded with one of its best years, going 24-13 in nonconference games and winning three New Year’s Day bowl games: USC the Rose, UCLA the Fiesta, Washington the Orange.

Washington finished No. 2 in the final Associated Press poll, and UCLA and USC were ninth and 10th, respectively.

Will it be payback time in Y2K? Next year, Michigan, Miami, Ohio State, Texas, Alabama and Notre Dame all come west.

HURRY-UP OFFENSE

* Through six games, coaches Paul Hackett of USC and John Robinson of Nevada Las Vegas are each 3-3. You can argue all day over which team inherited the better program.

* The Bowden family is already taking sides for Saturday night’s Florida State-Clemson game, in which Bobby Bowden seeks career win No. 300 against his son, Tommy, the first-year Tiger coach.

“I just got dreaded news today that my oldest son Steve is going to be on Tommy’s sideline,” Bobby Bowden said Wednesday. “Don’t let me forget to strike him from the will.”

More Bowdens: Two reasons Bobby can enhance his team’s national title position by running up the score on his son: 1) Seven of the eight computers used in the BCS formula consider point-differential in their formula; 2) A lopsided win also would dilute Virginia Tech’s early-season win over Clemson. Anything that hurts Virginia Tech in the BCS rankings helps Bobby Bowden.

But don’t expect Bobby to take his kid to the woodshed.

“If we did have a big lead, I wouldn’t be thinking about the BCS,” Bobby said, “I’d be thinking about Ann Bowden’s boy.”

* So, you don’t think football is religion in the South? Brock Berlin, one of the nation’s top prep quarterbacks, from Shreveport, La., disclosed this week he will attend Florida. Berlin made the announcement at the First Assembly Church of God. Then again, the prospect of four years with Steve Spurrier might make any quarterback God-fearing.