A Perfect Ending for Seminoles, BCS

It is fitting Bobby Bowden won his second national championship at age 70 because he is the reigning poster septuagenarian for what college football is and where it is not going.

Bowden is a throwback in a sport that continues to amazingly and successfully thumb its nose at the future.

Bowden is “dad-gum” and Sunday school yarns, a man who can charmingly say Peter Warrick was “over-accused,” a man who remembers a time when troubles with players were settled privately by a coach and chief of police.

Bowden and his sport are gracefully aging anachronisms.

Dad-gum, ain’t it great?

Bowden isn’t going anywhere soon, and neither is the status quo.

“Where’s a 70-year-old going to retire off to?” Bowden quipped Wednesday, the morning after Florida State defeated Virginia Tech, 46-29, in the Sugar Bowl. “Is there a saloon out there that I don’t know about?”

Let’s face it: This year’s national title game was a white-water thriller, put together by a consortium known as the bowl championship series.

Bowden could have been speaking on behalf of the BCS when he proudly said: “When I get up and leave here, I want you to watch how much I strut.”

Wednesday was a dark day for youth movements and college football playoff advocates, but a great day for leather heads who think their sport doesn’t have to operate like the others.

On the day New Orleans Saint Coach Mike Ditka was fired after a 3-13 season in the pro ranks, Bowden talked joyfully of returning for his 25th, 26th, 27th and 28th seasons as Florida State coach.

“I see so many people retire and die,”’ Bowden said. “I still have the same fear of losing, the same desire to win, love for the game and love for the kids.”

Yes, the college game is different, and that’s what so burns the people who desperately want to change it.

In college, a Bobby Bowden can be more successful at 70 than he was at 50. His Seminoles won 109 games in the 1990s and two national titles.

This year’s 12-0 team became the first team to start and finish a season at No. 1 since the Associated Press began its preseason poll in 1950.

Whether Florida State or Nebraska is the team of the decade can be debated. The Seminoles have the higher winning percentage, .890 to .868, while Nebraska has one more national title, three to two.

Even if quarterback Chris Weinke, a junior, decides to make himself eligible for the NFL draft, as expected, Florida State figures to continue chasing titles.

“Will we be back next year?” Bowden asked. “You bet your life.”

The Seminoles figure to lose three important cogs in Weinke, receiver Warrick and kicker Sebastian Janikowski, but more than enough talent returns for them to contend.

The player to watch will be sophomore-to-be Anquan Boldin, who amassed 11,433 total yards as a quarterback at Florida’s Pahokee High.

Boldin played wide receiver this year for the Seminoles, but his run-pass skills may precipitate a move to quarterback.

Bowden said Marcus Outzen would get first shot at Weinke’s job, followed by Jared Jones.

“If they falter,” Bowden said, “I’d say ‘Boldin, come here; me, you got to talk.’ ”

Next year’s preseason top five, in no particular order, figure to look like this: Nebraska, Texas, Alabama, Florida State and Virginia Tech.

And, once again, the titlist will be determined by the BCS computer.

Those of you calling for a playoff: There’s as much chance of that happening as making contact with that Mars lander.

“We know what the perfect situation is,” Big East Commissioner Mike Tranghese said of the playoff question, “but I don’t think the [university] presidents are ready to endorse it.”

For the second year, the BCS worked. While the four-pronged rankings formula may be delicious brain food for computer geeks, the BCS produced clear-cut teams to play for the national title.

Attendance for bowls dropped a bit this year, but ratings for the BCS games preceding the Sugar Bowl--Rose, Orange, Fiesta--improved 4% from last year.

“The BCS is what it is, for better or worse,” Tranghese said this week.

The BCS appears almost certain to accept ABC’s four-year, $400-million contract extension through 2006, which would kill all hopes of a playoff before then.

The original BCS deal would have expired in 2002, with a three-year option. The football extension pales in comparison to the $6 billion CBS will pay for NCAA basketball tournament rights, but the BCS doesn’t have the same negotiation leverage because the Rose Bowl’s contract with the Big Ten and Pacific 10 runs through 2005.

Tranghese said no one has coerced the BCS into its current state.

“It’s not ABC’s fault,” he said. “We elected to take the money. If someone wants to blame anybody, blame us.”

That doesn’t mean the BCS can’t be improved.

For one, BCS headquarters should and probably will be moved out of the Southeastern Conference offices in Birmingham, Ala., to remove at least the perception of a conflict of interest involving Roy Kramer, who serves two masters as SEC commissioner and BCS director.

Also, if there isn’t going to be a playoff, can’t we at least move the national title game to Jan. 1?

The first two BCS title games were played on Jan. 4. On Jan. 3, 2002, a Thursday, the national title game will be at the Rose Bowl, three days after the Rose Bowl parade.

“This is coming from me personally,” Tranghese said, “but Jan. 1 was college football. I grew up with that. In a perfect world, I wish we could play Jan. 1 because that’s always been our day.”

Lastly, our suggested tweak: The BCS rankings need to put more, not less, emphasis on a team’s strength of schedule.

Virginia Tech proved a viable title contender, but should a team be rewarded so greatly for playing the 53rd-toughest schedule?

If a team is going to be eliminated from national title consideration for losing a tough nonconference game against a ranked opponent, what’s the incentive for playing a tough nonconference opponent?

“I’d like to see some element that rewards people for playing nonconference games,” Tranghese said. “I think people are hiding within their conferences.”

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Final Polls

By ASSOCIATED PRESS

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Team Record Points Prv. 1. Florida State (70) 12-0 1,750 1 2. Virginia Tech 11-1 1,647 2 3. Nebraska 12-1 1,634 3 4. Wisconsin 10-2 1,519 4 5. Michigan 10-2 1,406 8 6. Kansas State 11-1 1,402 7 7. Michigan State 10-2 1,357 9 8. Alabama 10-3 1,236 5 9. Tennessee 9-3 1,168 6 10. Marshall 13-0 1,136 11 11. Penn State 10-3 1,038 13 12. Florida 9-4 941 10 13. Mississippi State 10-2 923 15 14. Southern Mississippi 9-3 788 16 15. Miami 9-4 678 23 16. Georgia 8-4 640 21 17. Arkansas 8-4 575 24 18. Minnesota 8-4 452 12 19. Oregon 9-3 358 -- 20. Georgia Tech 8-4 345 17 21. Texas 9-5 340 14 22. Mississippi 8-4 281 -- 23. Texas A&M; 8-4 272 18 24. Illinois 8-4 201 -- 25. Purdue 7-5 198 19

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Others receiving votes: Stanford 168, East Carolina 97, Colorado 75, Texas Christian 45, Syracuse 21, Utah 20, Hawaii 19, Washington 7, Wake Forest 5, Boise State 3, Oklahoma 3, Colorado State 2.

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By USA TODAY/ESPN

Final

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Team Record Points Prv. 1. Florida State (59) 12-0 1,475 1 2. Nebraska 12-1 1,390 3 3. Virginia Tech 11-1 1,366 2 4. Wisconsin 10-2 1,283 4 5. Michigan 10-2 1,189 8 6. Kansas State 11-1 1,188 7 7. Michigan State 10-2 1,117 9 8. Alabama 10-3 1,042 6 9. Tennessee 9-3 985 5 10. Marshall 13-0 856 11 11. Penn State 10-3 840 17 12. Mississippi State 10-2 810 16 13. Southern Mississippi 9-3 763 14 14. Florida 9-4 713 10 15. Miami 9-4 605 23 16. Georgia 8-4 505 24 17. Minnesota 8-4 395 12 18. Oregon 9-3 375 -- 19. Arkansas 8-4 357 -- 20. Texas A&M; 8-4 344 13 21. Georgia Tech 8-4 337 15 22. Mississippi 8-4 231 -- 23. Texas 9-5 173 18 24. Stanford 8-4 155 21 25. Illinois 8-4 139 --

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Also receiving votes: East Carolina 119, Purdue 118, Texas Christian 54, Colorado 49, Hawaii 27, Utah 21, Brigham Young 17, Colorado State 9, Wake Forest 8, Ohio State 6, Syracuse 6, Washington 4, Boise State 2, Oklahoma 2.