Of all the "what If's" about LSU and USC why doesnt the media bring up USC and LSu's common opponnents? If I remember right, LSU faired as well or better than USC? I guess that point would not help the media pull down the BCS.
One station Did they said that USC shut down its two common opponents but they did not mention that USC first team was in till the end of the Auburn game or that in the Arizona game the first team was still in till middle of the 4th. USC did not let the common opponents score.:dis:
LSU and usc beat their common by comparable margins. The difference in the rest of their opponent's strength is, to me, the most alarming. The BCS simply disputes the validity of the writer's opinions and they will not stop until it is either illiminated or made a puppet of the human voters. Fug em, I'm loving all this NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP sunshine and ther aint no rain in the forecast.
THE National Champion By Beau Doolittle with Dr. Ronny Daigle I am an LSU fan and have been for all of my 32 years on this planet. I woke up this morning with the knowledge that my team is THE National Champion of Division I College Football for the 2003 season. Prior to the season, it was determined that the winner of the Sugar Bowl would be THE National Champion. On Sunday night, I witnessed LSU defeat the University of Oklahoma by a score of 21-14 in the 2004 Nokia Sugar Bowl. A jihad led by a group of media is trying to take that away from my team. How bad is it? The message board in the Super Dome after the game had the somewhat pejorative message of “BCS†National Champions. The rules of college football were simple and laid out in black and white before the season. Every college football player, coach, athletic director and university administrator as well as every member of the media knew that to win THE National Championship a team must win the 2004 Nokia Sugar Bowl. Coach Nick Saban and his team know this. I applaud them for the humility and class that they have displayed in handling the situation. Contrast this to Southern Cal coach Pete Carroll and his grandstanding. Certain members of the media have distorted LSU’s graciousness into some type of admission that the Tigers are not the ‘true’ national champion. I am glad that Coach Saban and the team have remained above the debate, but I am weary of the attack on my team and think it appropriate that we as fans do what we can to set the record straight. There are two fundamental elements to examine in the debate of the national championship. One is the controversy surrounding the BCS that has been created by the media and the motives for it. The second is a simple assessment of the performances this season of LSU and Southern Cal that disproves the veracity of the media’s claim that Southern Cal is the top team. The following has been prepared with assistance from Dr. Ronny Daigle. THE BCS CONTROVERSY AND THE MEDIA. - The BCS system was designed to provide a two-team, one-game playoff for the national championship. - The BCS was endorsed by ALL members of the six major conferences and Notre Dame, as well as the coaches association. The Pac-10 and its members agreed to the BCS system without having their arms twisted at all. The coaches association agreed to the BCS system without having their arms twisted at all. By agreeing to the BCS, the Pac-10, all its members, members of the other five BCS conferences, members of the coaches association, and Notre Dame are stating that neither the AP and coaches polls or a combination of the two are sufficient for determining THE national champion. (RD) - Saying that they didn’t want to ‘make the news’ the AP Pollsters refused to be a primary determinant in the selection of the two participants for the game. Instead a system was devised that would take into account the so-called ‘human’ polls as well as seven different computer polls, the number of losses, quality wins and strength of schedule and make and OBJECTIVE decision as to which two teams should play for THE National Championship. These rules were in place prior to the start of the season. - In other college sports where the media is polled, namely college basketball, the polls are NOT a primary consideration when seeding teams for postseason play. In both basketball and baseball a principal factor is the Ratings Percentage Index (RPI). The AP writers in college basketball name the winner of the postseason championship that is scheduled by the NCAA as their ‘national champion’ and NOT the team that they ranked first at the end of the regular season. - LSU got penalized in the BCS for beating Georgia twice (LSU lost quality victory points) and LSU still ended up higher than USC in the BCS. LSU played UL-Monroe and Western Illinois because Marshall and Troy State backed out of their commitments to LSU, and LSU still had a stronger schedule. (RD) - The media’s contention that the BCS is flawed this season primarily consists of the fact that the results that the BCS poll came up with after OBJECTIVELY measuring teams based on predetermined guidelines differed from the SUBJECTIVE opinion of the polls and therefore must be wrong. - Southern Cal’s ranking is the ‘human polls’ is SUBJECTIVE in nature. In addition, the ranking at the end of the regular season was not a unanimous mandate as is implied with 23 of 65 (35%) voters in the AP poll and 26 of 63 (41%) believing a team other than Southern Cal was No. 1. - Both polls became suspect in their rankings after OU lost to Kansas State so badly. There is no credible reason for 2 AP pollsters and 8 coaches to vote OU number 1 after they got beat in their own conference championship game by 4 touchdowns. (RD) - In the final AP Poll, LSU lost four of its 21 first place votes despite beating a higher ranked team that Southern Cal did. (I am assuming that no other votes changed) In addition, the two voters who had previously thought Oklahoma to be number one in the country chose not to vote the team that beat Oklahoma as number one. Why is this? - One voter in the final AP Poll voted LSU THIRD! Note that LSU had 31 fewer first place votes but 32 fewer points. - The Final AP poll still ranks Oklahoma, despite losing its last two games, third. Oklahoma is three spots ahead of Southern Cal’s Rose Bowl opponent, Michigan. In other words, the AP Voters recognize that LSU defeated a better team than Southern Cal did, yet still refuse to give LSU any credit. - The AP’s treatment of Michigan is curious. After the SEC Championship, Georgia dropped from 5th to 11th after losing to LSU. Michigan fell only two spots after losing to Southern Cal. In addition, the 10-3 Wolverines are the highest three-loss team despite a loss to UNRANKED Oregon. Georgia is one spot behind Michigan despite the fact that the Dogs lost twice to LSU and once to a ranked Florida club. Iowa is ranked two spots lower despite a head-to-head win over Michigan - There are other reasons to question the AP poll. One glaring example is that Ohio State finished with the same record as Oklahoma and defeated the team that Oklahoma lost to in its final regular season game (Kansas State) but is behind the Sooners. - A popular rallying call of the elitist media (the ones that don’t want to ‘make the news’) was that the ESPN/USA Today Coaches’ Poll is flawed because the coaches were uninformed and/or had an SID vote. Yet both the AP and the ESPN/USA Today polls had the same Top Five teams. Does this not mean that both polls were flawed? Also, while its reasonable to accept that a Sports Information Director would not be as qualified to judge a football team as a coach, the insinuation is that an SID is somehow less qualified to judge teams than a sportswriter. As a former SID, I am offended by that charge. - Not only are the sportswriters trying to “make the news†by letting their vote determine the champion, but they are also attempting to once again promote their agenda of creating some from of a playoff system. One of the biggest problems with this is that the main mantras of the pro-playoff crowd is to let what happens on the field determine the champion. Because the writers’ subjective opinion differs with the on-field results of the two-team playoff game for the National Championship, the writers named their own champion. That’s hypocritical in my view. - One of the writers’ main challenges against the selection of Oklahoma for the National Championship game was that they did not win their conference championship. (Does this mean that the Florida Marlins should return their World Series Trophy?) Yet, most of these same writers favor a playoff that would include 8-16 teams, including teams that did not win their conference championship. So in addition to proving them to be hypocrites, it also proves that the writers will once again use any rhetoric at their disposal to make their case. - The notion of winning the conference championship is also somewhat overrated. It’s not outside the realm of possibility for a team to lose one game in its conference and fail to win its conference title or make its conference championship game. Had Southern Cal lost to Washington State instead of Cal, they would not have won their conference title, but still had the same record and conceivably the same ranking. - The Pac-10 and anyone else could have tried to make changes before this season regarding a team not winning its conference title being in the national championship game (ala Nebraska). I would think the Pac-10 would have lobbied hard enough to change the rules after Oregon got left out in favor of Nebraska two years ago. (RD) - Speaking of losses that exclude teams from National Championship contention, Southern Cal lost to SIX LOSS California, a team that did not receive a single vote in the final edition of the AP Top 25. How is this justified? - Other than the inclusion of the ‘Human Polls’, the BCS formula judges teams objectively based purely on their merits in relation to prescribed criteria. The AP and Coaches polls are inherently flawed because of a tendency to maintain the status quo. Teams are ranked in the preseason before any on the field results are released and movement in the polls in primarily based on teams losing. In rare cases a team will move down after a close win against a lesser opponent, but the norm is for a team that wins to hold its ranking. A team moving ahead of other higher ranked teams when they beat a highly ranked opponent is a slightly more common occurrence. - The media complained that teams were running up the score so the BCS hastily dropped margin of victory, in essence saying that a one-point win was as good as a 20-point win. Now, because six of seven computers disagree with the results of the SUBJECTIVE human polls there are calls to remove them. The only poll that has Southern Cal ranked first is Jason Blair’s! LSU vs. Southern Cal BREAKDOWN - LSU is 3-0 vs. teams ranked in the final AP Top Ten with wins over #3 Oklahoma and #7 Georgia (Twice) - Southern Cal is 2-0 vs. AP Top Ten teams with wins over #6 Michigan and #9 Washington State - LSU is 4-0 vs. teams ranked in the top 15 (top ten wins plus #13 Ole Miss) - Southern Cal is 2-0 vs. top 15 teams - LSU has SIX wins against teams that finished in the AP Top 30 (including the receiving votes listing) - Southern Cal has THREE wins against teams that finished in the AP Top 30 - The sixth-highest ranked team LSU defeated (30th-ranked Auburn) was the third-best team that Southern Cal recorded a win over. - LSU’s lone loss was the 24th ranked Florida. The Gators five losses were ALL to nationally ranked Miami (5th in final AP Poll), Tennessee (15th), Ole Miss (13th), Florida State (11th) and Iowa (8th). In addition to beating LSU the Gators posted a win over No. 6 UGA and Arkansas (27th-RV) - Southern Cal’s loss was to UNRANKED and SIX LOSS California. Cal’s six losses were to Kansas State (13th) and Utah (21st) and UNRANKED Colorado State, Oregon State, UCLA and Oregon. Cal beat no other ranked teams. - Southern Cal plays basically a home game in the Rose Bowl against the fourth-ranked team in the country (a team which also had a loss to an unranked opponent as well) and wins by two touchdowns the game is called a dominating victory by the media which immediately declares Southern Cal national champs days before the polls come out. - LSU defeats Georgia in front of heavily partisan crowd for the Bulldogs in the Georgia Dome by THREE touchdowns. “Good game†says the media. - All LSU heard after playing Georgia early in the season was that LSU better pray they did not have to play Georgia again in Atlanta because the better team did not win the first time. Some national media claimed that Georgia not only was the better team, but they had the advantage in the rematch of playing for revenge, as well as playing in their own backyard. Considering all this, the second victory by LSU over Georgia should be all the more impressive as to how great LSU was this season. (RD) - LSU faced Oklahoma in the Sugar Bowl, a team that prior to suffering an upset at the hand of Kansas State was considered a juggernaut and one of the best teams in football history. The Sooners were the top scoring offense and total defense in the nation heading into the game. The Sooner defense boasted defensive lineman Tommie Harris, Lombardi Award winner and All-American, linebacker Teddy Lehman, Butkus Award winner, Bednarik Award winner, and All-American, and defensive back Derrick Strait, Nagurski Award winner, Thorpe Award winner, and All-American. The Sooner offense was one of the tops in the nation in scoring and features Heisman Trophy winner Jason White. White posted just 13 completions on 37 attempts for 102 yards and two interceptions, one returned for a touchdown, against the Tigers. After throwing 40 TD passes on the season, White threw none in the Sugar Bowl. The Sooners amassed just 154 total yards against the Tigers. Oklahoma averaged just 2.2 yards gained per play. (Info from LSUSports.net). After averaging 45 points on the year, LSU held them to 14, with both scores on short ‘drives’ after a blocked punt and interception, respectively. - LSU derailed any chance of Eli Manning (who is the likely number 1 pick in the upcoming NFL draft) of getting the Heisman trophy this season. LSU also made many question after this past Sunday whether Jason White should have gotten the Heisman trophy. I bet Larry Fitzgerald wished LSU would have played OU during the regular season. (RD) - Looking at the CollegeFootballNews.com rankings of all D-1 teams LSU’s top six victories were: #3 Oklahoma, #6 Georgia, #6 Georgia, #8 Ole Miss, #20 Arkansas, #25 Auburn. Southern Cal’s top six wins were #4 Michigan, #9 Washington State, #25 Auburn, #33 Oregon, #34 Oregon State, #51 UCLA. Florida, that beat LSU, was #24. California, which beat Southern Cal, was #35. NOTE: Somehow, the usually intelligent folks at CFN ranked Southern Cal first despite the facts their own rankings say otherwise. - LSU defeated common opponent Auburn 31-7 after the Tigers had won five-straight including wins over then-Top Ten ranked teams in Arkansas and Tennessee. LSU sprinted out to a 21-0 lead in early in the first quarter and cruised the rest of the way. Southern Cal defeated Auburn 23-0 to open the season during a two-game stretch where the Tigers failed to score a Touchdown. The Trojans scored 13 second half points after taking a 10-0 lead into halftime. - LSU defeated common opponent Arizona 59-13, scoring 38 first half points. The Trojans scored 35 first half points en route to a 45-0 win over the Wildcats. - Five SEC teams finished the season ranked in the AP Top 25 compared to two for the Pac-10. - The Pac-10 went 4-2 in the bowls with the only wins over ranked teams by Southern Cal (over No. 6 Michigan) and Washington State (over No. 12 Texas). UCLA lost to Fresno State and Oregon lost to No. 20 Minnesota. - The SEC went 5-2 in bowls with wins by LSU over No. 3 Oklahoma, Georgia over then No. 18 Purdue, Ole Miss over then No. 22 Oklahoma State. Florida lost to No 8 Iowa and Tennessee was upset by No. 22 Clemson. - All 7 SEC bowl opponents were from BCS conferences, compared to 4 for the Pac-10. Obviously of the 11 bowls, 9 (6 for the SEC and 3 for the Pac-10) had their choice as to whether to line up their bowl with a particular conference. The bowls' choice is clear -- the SEC is demanded more for post-season play than the Pac-10. (RD) - Only two Pac-10 won 10 or more games, compared to four in the SEC. - LSU beat a higher ranked opponent in their bowl game in Oklahoma than Southern Cal did in Michigan. The Sooners also had the motivation of playing for a national title. There seems to be a consensus among the media that Michigan was ill-prepared for its contest. - LSU’s opponents that went to bowls were 5-1 (counting UGA twice) all against BCS member schools. The wins were by Auburn (over Wisconsin), Georgia (over No. 18 Purdue), Ole Miss (over No. 22 Oklahoma State), and Arkansas (over Missouri). Florida lost to No. 8 Iowa. - Southern Cal’s opponents were 5-1 in bowls with four games against BCS member schools. Washington State (defeated Texas), Hawaii (over Houston), Auburn (over Wisconsin), Cal (over Virginia Tech) and Oregon State (New Mexico). Only Texas was ranked. UCLA lost to unranked Fresno State. - When LSU was handed the ADT National Championship Trophy Sunday evening, that trophy was given to LSU not by some person or committee. No, that trophy was handed to LSU by 65 teams from the 6 major conferences (and Notre Dame) and the entire coaches association, i.e., all those that agreed to be part of the BCS. Think about this event for a second -- SOUTHERN CAL, along with 64 other schools and 60 college coaches who voted (some from schools other than the six BCS conferences), gave that trophy over to LSU. By LSU receiving that trophy, those 65 schools and the coaches association are publicly recognizing that LSU is SOUTHERN CAL's (as well as everyone else's) better this season! There is absolutely no debate with this whatsoever. By agreeing to be a part of the BCS, whether they like or not, SOUTHERN CAL is acknowledging (begrudgingly, obviously) that LSU they are better and they are champion -- THE national champion! Considering this, in a quirky way, Miami of Ohio has a more legitimate reason than SOUTHERN CAL to gripe, as well as Tulane when they went undefeated a few years back, because their conferences are not part of the BCS. (RD) - Virginia Tech, who LSU played in Blacksburg in 2002 to open the season, was supposed to open the 2004 season in Baton Rouge. Virginia Tech backed out on this commitment during this past season, with the game rescheduled no earlier than 2007. Right now, LSU has not found any opponent yet for that game, and I suspect that the level of difficulty of finding one has gone up dramatically. After backing out on us, Virginia Tech scheduled a game with SOUTHERN CAL in the BCA classic near their own backyard (Landover, MD) for the weekend before the one in which they were to play LSU next season. I can’t help but conclude from these two events that Virginia Tech would rather take their chances against SOUTHERN CAL than against LSU. (RD) A militant group of the media has hijacked the National Championship from not only Louisiana State University but from the other 11 member institutions of the Southeastern Conferences and the institutions that comprise the ACC, Big East, Big Ten, Big 12 and Pac 10. This is not a public outcry that has been reported on by the media, but a case where the media has misused its power to create a frenzy among unwitting sports fans. What has occurred is insulting to our intelligence. For our part, one of the biggest victims is a university that Ronny and I call ours. Next time though, it could be Alabama, Auburn, Georgia, Florida, Tennessee or another of our SEC brothers. And even if it is a team from another conference, the winner of the BCS National Championship game is OUR National Champion and we should respect that. Southern Cal may call itself anything that it chooses to…that is their prerogative. ESPN may say they won a piece of “A†national title. The AP may vote them number one and call them “A†national champion and present them a trophy. This is done in the face of the fact that their poll corroborates that the Trojan’s success was achieved against lesser competition than LSU played. Neither the AP nor Southern Cal can also contest the most important fact of all: and that is that LSU won the 2004 Nokia Sugar Bowl which was recognized by the NCAA, the AFCA and the members of the conferences that comprise the BCS as THE National Championship game and is THE 2003 National Champion of Division I College Football. To borrow a phrase, that which they call a Rose by any other name is just a consolation game. Please take the time to pass this email along to other college football fans. Post it on message boards of your teams and other team’s boards. Print it out and share it with others via fax or regular mail. Most important of all, send it to any members of the local or national media that you know how to contact including your local paper’s editor. Remind them that their job is to REPORT the news and not to attempt to MAKE the news. Let them know that by the rules established prior to the season, LSU won THE National Championship on the field and is YOUR National Champion. Feel free to add any comments or other supporting evidence that you wish to contribute. Thank you and Geaux Tigers Beau R.M. Doolittle II, M. Ed. Ronald J. Daigle, Ph. D. LSU TIGERS – 2004 NATIONAL CHAMPIONS
