COMMENTARY: 54 schools ignored in BCS title race

— Do not get distracted by Boise State.

This is not easy because everything about Boise State is distracting. The winning. The Fiesta Bowl upset. The marriage proposal. The blue turf. The No. 3 ranking.

The people who make big money on the BCS hate what Boise State is doing, but they would love it if it took all of your attention.

They would love you to focus on asking this: Can Boise State make the BCS title game? Can a midmajor college football team finally break through?

But we shouldn’t spend the next eight weeks pondering the obvious: It can’t.

The first BCS poll came out this week and the Broncos aren’t in the top two. At least 10 teams will have to lose twice for Boise State to even have a chance to move up.

So we can get caught up in that drama, or the pointless debate about where the Broncos would be if they had to play a SEC schedule, as if Boise State is somehow ducking the challenge of playing in a big-time conference.

Or we could fix strained eyeballs on the most important fact, something no BCS supporter can explain away. Toledo can’t win the national title. Neither can Marshall. Neither can Louisiana-Monroe. Neither can Fresno State.

We are not talking about a few disadvantaged teams. In major-college football, 54 teams are ineligible for the national title this season. No matter what they do, or who they play, they cannot win it all.

At Notre Dame, the players touch a sign that reads, “Play like a champion today.” At San Diego State, that would be silly. The Aztecs can’t be champions.

At Army, football cadets want to be the best they can be. Perfect, because they can’t be national champions, either.

Outside the six power conferences and Notre Dame, everyone else is powerless.

There is no similar scenario to compare it to, that 45 percent of the teams in a sport would be ineligible for the title. This year, it’s actually 55 ineligible teams. The punishment the NCAA gave Southern California for Reggie Bush’s major violations is reality at Bowling Green.

The rest serve as minor leagues of major college football, to fill out schedules and train its future millionaire coaches.

The BCS didn’t invent the prejudiced wall down the middle of big-time football. It just made it taller.

The equivalent would be if everyone in the American League were ineligible for the World Series. (The San Francisco Giants might like that right about now.) Or if 70 golfers in the U.S. Open field weresimply there to fill TV time until Sunday.

The 54 extras in major-college football meet the NCAA requirements. They have to follow the same rules. They just can’t be No. 1.

Boise State football played 10 unbelievable years to get to the end of a maze with no cheese. Why would talented players go to programs that don’t matter? Why would they buy into the notion of building a midmajor program when there’s nothing to build toward?

What Boise State is doing is interesting and entertaining, but ultimately a distraction from the fact that matters, to the changes college football needs. If an improbable scenario does put the Broncos in the BCS championship game it would give footing to the people with the game under their boots.

See, they’d say, it can be done.

Real sports fans would rather see what should be done.

Sports, Pages 28 on 10/24/2010

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