A Title for Miami and Face-Saver for the BCS

Streaking past Nebraska in a flood of long passes and dazzling runs, the University of Miami crushed Nebraska in college football’s title game at the Rose Bowl Thursday night, capping an undefeated season and making the Hurricanes undisputed national champs.

The winning score was 37-14, but Miami put the game beyond reach early and piled it on en route to a 34-0 halftime lead.

The outcome also counted as a partial victory for an embattled formula that seeks to place the best two teams in the title game.

And, football aside, the 88th installment of the storied bowl was a welcome boost to a local economy that suffered through a sluggish holiday season.

Many of the tourist dollars came from an army of Nebraska fans--as many as 60,000 by some estimates--who bathed the stadium in a sea of red only to watch glumly as the Cornhuskers were swept away by the orange-and-green Hurricanes.

“We had to go out and make a statement from the beginning,” Miami offensive tackle Bryant McKinnie said. “We knew that would quiet their fans down.”

This was the first time the Rose Bowl hosted a title game for the 4-year-old bowl championship series, commonly called the BCS. So, in many ways, it was an unusual installment for college football’s most traditional event.

The so-called “Granddaddy of Them All” was moved from its usual Jan. 1 date and for the first time started at dusk. Security was unprecedented, with cars searched in the parking lots and the 93,781 fans patted down as they arrived.

The extra precautions led to half-mile-long lines at stadium gates and considerable grumbling: “You’d think they never had a Rose Bowl game before,” Nebraska fan Mary Ellen Eglseder complained. Still, most fans arrived early enough to reach their seats by the 5:20 p.m. kickoff.

Departing from its tradition of pitting the champions from the Pacific 10 and Big Ten conferences, this Rose Bowl matched the top two teams selected by the BCS.

Unlike other college sports, Division I-A football has no playoffs. The BCS was created to fill the void by combining the rankings from the Associated Press and ESPN/USA Today polls, eight computer services and several other calculations.

The championship rotates among four bowl games: the Orange, Sugar, Fiesta and Rose.

Nebraska Helps Make Critics’ Case

So Miami came from the Big East Conference and Nebraska from the Big 12. As for the latter, critics have argued that the BCS sent the wrong team to Pasadena.

In its final game of the regular season, Nebraska seemingly fell out of the title race with an embarrassing 62-36 loss to Colorado.

But several highly ranked teams--including Texas and Tennessee--suffered upsets in the ensuing weeks.

The Cornhuskers, while not playing another game, rebounded to No. 4 in the major polls. More surprisingly, they jumped to No. 2 in the BCS ratings.

Many fans thought Pacific 10 champion Oregon (11-1), ranked second, or Big 12 champion Colorado (10-3), ranked third, were more deserving. The clamor grew louder when Oregon dominated Colorado, 38-16, in the Fiesta Bowl on New Year’s Day.

As if to emphasize this point, fans dressed in Oregon green could be seen scattered among the crowd of red and orange on Thursday.

“Obviously some people didn’t think Nebraska should be here,” Miami receiver Daryl Jones said.

Don’t count local merchants among them.

Nebraska brought enough fans to fill three-quarters of the stadium. Hotels rented their rooms at inflated prices. Residents around the stadium were hawking parking spaces on their lawns for $25 a car.

That led a game planner to comment that the teams and their conferences--which received a whopping $11.75 million each for reaching this game--weren’t the only ones making money.

“The participating conferences gain a great deal from this, but the real winner is the economy of Southern California,” said Mitch Dorger, chief executive of the Tournament of Roses.

And though critics might say Oregon would have provided a more competitive opponent than Nebraska, the BCS profited by way of a response: In the end, the sometimes mystifying BCS formula produced a worthy champion.

Miami, which ended its season a perfect 12-0, wasted little time in proving that.

Hurricanes End the Suspense Early

After an uneventful first few minutes, the Hurricane defense forced Nebraska’s Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback, Eric Crouch, to fumble and the offense capitalized with a 49-yard touchdown pass on the very next snap.

That quickly, the rout was on.

“Miami lives and dies with big plays and they were killing us all night long,” Nebraska linebacker Jamie Burrow said afterward.

Hurricane running back Clinton Portis scored on a 39-yard touchdown run. Safety James Lewis returned an interception 47 yards into the end zone. Quarterback Ken Dorsey threw two more touchdown passes and the score was 34-0 at halftime.

“We had to play catch-up,” Nebraska running back Dahrran Diedrick said. “Our offense wasn’t built for that.”

The Cornhuskers (11-2) managed two late touchdowns, not nearly enough to keep Miami from dancing on the brightly painted field after the final gun.

Any more questions about the national champion?

“I tell you what,” Miami offensive lineman Joaquin Gonzalez said. “12-0.”