BCS Coordinator Seeks Poll Emphasis

Bowl championship series coordinator Mike Tranghese said Friday he would like to see the human element play a bigger role in college football’s national championship formula.

“I’d like to see us go back to using the human polls,” Tranghese told USA Today for a story on its Web site, “but I don’t think we can get that done.”

Tranghese expects conference commissioners to soon discuss possible changes in the controversial system that selects the two teams that play in the national championship game. Tranghese said one change could be giving more weight to the Associated Press poll and the USA Today/ESPN coaches’ poll than computer rankings.

USC was ranked No. 1 in both polls at the end of the regular season but was third in the BCS standings and left out of the Sugar Bowl -- this season’s BCS national title game in which Louisiana State and Oklahoma will play Sunday night.

The Trojans virtually assured themselves a piece of the national championship Thursday with a 28-14 victory over Michigan in the Rose Bowl because voters almost certainly will leave the Trojans atop the Associated Press poll no matter what happens in the Sugar Bowl.

Voters for the USA Today/ESPN coaches’ poll are obligated to name the winner of the BCS championship game as its national champion.

That would produce a split national championship, just what the BCS was designed to avoid.

“I can tell you the six commissioners do not take any delight or pleasure in having to defend a poll we didn’t want to have in the first place,” said Tranghese. “I don’t think we have a choice but to take a hard look at this.”

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The tug-of-war between Nebraska and Arkansas over Coach Houston Nutt continued, with Nutt mulling a $2 million a year offer to coach the Cornhuskers and Arkansas scrambling to make a counteroffer.

The Omaha World-Herald reported Friday night that a Nebraska charter plane that was to transport Nutt to Lincoln, Neb., for a news conference left Arkansas Regional Airport with only the pilots. “We’re still negotiating. It’s up to him,” Arkansas Athletic Director Frank Broyles told Associated Press.

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Central Florida Coach George O’Leary, 56, was released from a Minnesota hospital, two days after having a mild heart attack. ... Kent State hired Jon Wauford, the assistant coach who resigned at Miami of Ohio after being accused of striking a fan following a Nov. 12, 2002 game at Marshall. He has been coaching high school football in Clinton, Iowa.