Now I know I've been away for a little bit and my blog has suffered, as has my ability to watch football on the weekends, so I figured I'd go ahead and check in on my favorite topic as sort of a easing back into the whole blogging thing.
In Idaho, the sky is falling and everything has gone to hell at Smurf Village. The Boise State Broncos started the year ranked Number 3 in the AP Top 25 college football poll. Since then, they have done nothing but been stellar. Prior to today's match up with Hawaii, the Broncos boast a perfect 7-0 record and have climbed to the 2nd spot in the AP poll.
Led by Quarterback Kellen Moore, who has the nations best QB Rating at 188.3, the Bronco offense finds itself in the top 5 rankings for both Yards and Points per Game. Boise State's average margin of victory in its 7 games this year, a whopping 36.3 points, a number that is limited by a 3 point season opening victory against then number 10 Va Tech.
The Bronco defensive unit has been even more impressive. Led by a monstrous Defensive Line that has racked up a robust 24.0 sacks, the D has pitched two shut outs and held a third team to under 10 points. In games against teams not named Va Tech and Oregon State, Boise is only allowing 8 points a game.
Despite these impressive numbers, the Broncos find themselves actually going in reverse when it comes to the BCS rankings. When the end all be all here's your champion poll was released, Boise debuted at number 3 behind Oregon and Oklahoma. The following Saturday, Boomer Sooner comes up short losing to Mizzou. Thanks to a Tuesday night match-up with Louisiana Tech the Bronco's spent that Saturday watching Auburn earn an impressive win against LSU instead of playing. Coincidentally, a day later, the Broncos watched the War Eagle leap frog Boise in the BCS.
The Smurf Turf was rocking that Tuesday as Kellen Moore throws for two touchdowns and actually catches a third en route to a 49-20 victory. That mid week game, however, meant that Boise would again be dormant on college football Saturday. Now, a sane man would not expect that a home victory over a 3-5 team would be enough for Boise to knock either Oregon or Auburn down a peg, but that same sane man wouldn't expect TCU's 48-6 victory over a 1 win UNLV team to be enough for the Horned Frogs to over take Boise either.
Unfortunately for the fans in Idaho, there's absolutely nothing the Broncos can do. The debate throughout the preseason was can Boise do enough to earn a spot in final two. There were a couple of things that needed to happen in order for Chris Peterson's team to get a Championship Bid. First and foremost, win all the time and win big, check. Then you'll need a little help along the way, in other words, someone has to beat Alabama or Ohio State. Double check there, both South Carolina and Wisconsin gave Boise an early Christmas present in a pair of October wins.
Even though all of this has happened, Boise still finds itself on the outside looking in. It's not the Bronco's fault that the Hokies laid an egg against James Madison and is only ranked 20th in the nation. Boise also wasn't on the field two weeks ago when Oregon State lost in double over-time to Washington, a game they have yet to recover from in the rankings.
And while it appears the fates of two other teams is damning the Broncos, the Horned Frogs seemed to be unphased by it. It's understood and agreed upon that after today, TCU will have played an opponent much better than Boise has. But the simple fact of the matter remains, to date, the Broncos have played a schedule that is more difficult than the Horned Frogs. TCU's biggest win of the year was a 9 point win against Oregon State, the same Beaver squad that Boise beat by 13 points two weeks later.
It's not even an issue anymore as to whether or not the pollsters want a non automatic qualifier in the championship game. If there's one thing the BCS rankings have shown this year, it's that one big game makes all the difference. In other words, should TCU beat Utah today, the Frog's will most certainly find themselves ranked in one of the top two spots. Even more frustrating for Boise fans, should Utah beat TCU, Utah will probably find themselves moving into TCU's potentially vacant spot, if not the Number 2 spot in the BCS.
As we enter the final quarter of the college football season we're exactly where we started at. If Boise has any shot of making the Championship, they need to win out and win big as well as finding a little help along the way. About the best thing that can happen for the Broncos is for TCU to win tonight. The Horned Frogs will have reached the apex of their BCS ranking and will require total destruction of San Diego State and New Mexico to maintain that ranking.
One could argue that a Utah win would do more for the Broncos, but they don't realize that the Utes still have three games, two of which against Notre Dame and BYU. And if there's one thing thing the media likes to do, it's pay tribute to the tradition of big named schools, no matter how bad they are.
Cough, Cough, Notre Dame, Cough, Michigan, Cough, Cough
Boise will also need both Va Tech and Oregon State to win out. The Hokies would find themselves ending up around number 15 in that scenario but Oregon State would be the key. The Beavers final two games of the year are against Stanford and the Civil War against Oregon. Consecutive wins against highly ranked teams will surely boost the Beaver's credibility, and, in turn, boost Boise's credibility, especially in the computer polls.
After all, the computers are the reason Boise is even in this position to begin with. Wait a minute, maybe Skynet really does exist.
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