Rose Bowl Needs Escape to the Past

USC Coach Pete Carroll stood with a group of reporters, discussing potential bowl scenarios. When a Washington State-Florida State Rose Bowl spun by on the merry-go-round, Carroll paused to ask, “Whatever happened to Pac-10, Big Ten?”

It’s a modern-day version of “Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio?”

This isn’t easy to say, kids, but the Granddaddy has been sent to the nursing home. The oldest, purest and best bowl game has moved over for this fraudulent excuse for a national championship known as the BCS.

The only way for the Rose Bowl, as we knew it, to come back is to escape -- and pull the Pacific 10 and Big Ten conferences along with it.

If we’re stuck with bowls (because the playoff fairy won’t be appearing any time soon), we might as well do them properly.

The Rose Bowl used to have the cleanest format. The winners of the Pac-10 and the Big Ten played in Pasadena on New Year’s Day (unless Jan. 1 fell on a Sunday). Money and politics didn’t enter the discussion.

Now there’s far too much discussion. Before USC beat Notre Dame last Saturday, the focus was on whether the Trojans could get shut out of a BCS game even with a victory. This week there’s still talk about possible trips to the Orange or Sugar bowls.

The focus for any Pac-10 team should always be Pasadena. But it’s clear the Trojans have South Beach and the French Quarter on their minds as well.

When Troy Polamalu was asked if the Rose Bowl were still the team’s primary goal he replied, “Uh, well ... yeah, definitely. USC is always synonymous with the Rose Bowl. But we’ll see what happens.”

There should be no, uhs, wells, buts or ellipses about it.

A Rose Bowl bid for USC -- or Washington State, for that matter -- would be hassle-free. If UCLA beats Washington State on Saturday, the Trojans get to go because they had the fewest conference losses in the Pac-10. If Washington State beats UCLA on Saturday, the Cougars deserve to go because they beat USC head-to-head.

But if USC goes to the Orange Bowl ahead of Kansas State, there will be legitimate complaints coming from the plains that the 10-2 Wildcats, who beat USC, didn’t get a fair shot.

Being BCS-free means never having to apologize.

And it doesn’t necessarily mean going broke.

Currently, a conference gets to split $13.5 million for putting one team in a BCS game and gains $4.5 million more if a second team is selected.

The Rose Bowl traditionally has a large payout, with or without the BCS. It would have no problem keeping pace with BCS bucks.

“Your finances come from two main sources: ticket sales and television revenues,” Pac-10 assistant commissioner Jim Muldoon said. “Would the television networks be willing to pay what they’re paying for a BCS bowl? I think you could probably approach it.”

Right now, ABC has locked up the rights to all of the BCS bowls. Perhaps a sports-starved NBC would be interested in showcasing the Rose Bowl by itself on New Year’s Day.

What about that second-team payout?

For the Big Ten, the tie-in to the Capital One (formerly Citrus) Bowl in Orlando, Fla., for its second-place team brings in $4.25 million, which is more money than any other non-BCS bowl pays. Bolting the BCS would help keep the Capital One Bowl an attractive game instead of contributing to the ripple effect that weakens all of the non-championship bowls. For example, the Big Ten could have sent co-champion Iowa this year and those Hawkeye fans would have flocked to Florida. Instead, with Iowa BCS-bound, the Capital One Bowl picked fourth-place Penn State (9-3 overall, 5-3 in the Big Ten) rather than invite third-place Michigan (9-3, 6-2), which had played in the game the previous two years.

The destination for the Pac-10’s second team, the Holiday Bowl in San Diego, pays only $1.9 million. But at least the conference wouldn’t have to spend money to make money. The conference has been willing to give up to $500,000 in travel packages to entice the less-motivated Southern California fans to leave their sunny climate and fly all the way to New Orleans or Miami just to ensure enough hotel room bookings to satisfy the bowls. With USC, UCLA, Arizona, Arizona State, California and Stanford all within a day’s drive of San Diego, that wouldn’t be necessary. And fans in the chilly, rainy Pacific Northwest would be eager to come down to the perfect weather at the Holiday Bowl.

What about the other major issue, the fear of exclusion from the national championship picture?

Well, BCS membership hasn’t made a difference for the Pac-10, which was shut out of the first four BCS title games and probably won’t get a crack at this one.

And Ohio State’s Fiesta Bowl trip will mark the Big Ten’s first invite to the “championship” game. But they’ll lose to Miami anyway.

Michigan won a share of the national championship with a victory over Washington State in the 1998 Rose Bowl. And under the current scenario, the media could still deem a worthy team champion, even if it didn’t play in the BCS championship game.

The indications from Pasadena are that the Rose Bowl folks are having second thoughts. They knew going in that they’d have almost guaranteed irrelevance in the three years they didn’t play host to the title game. When the Rose Bowl finally did get a crack at No. 1 vs. No. 2, it was that Miami-Nebraska dud.

Now they’re missing out on Ohio State -- and possibly Iowa.

“I know the Tournament [of Roses] is looking at all their potential matchups and not happy with some of them,” Muldoon said.

But he sounded skeptical that the other participants -- especially the Big Ten -- could be persuaded to return to the old setup.

None of the talk coming from the Big Ten office indicates a willingness to change.

“We are committed to the BCS system,” Big Ten associate commissioner Sue Lister said.

Remember when the commitment belonged to the Rose Bowl?

There’s always hope for a reconciliation with that old relationship, that faithful one that worked for 55 years.

J.A. Adande can be reached at:

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j.a.adande@latimes.com.