This one was way messier than it appears, especially in real life. Oklahoma are the #1 seed, as 12-1 champs of the Big XII. But, you’ll notice fellow Big XII South division teams Texas and Texas Tech(!) are here, also at 11-1. These three finished the season tied with each other, each one’s only loss coming to one of the others in a way that made tiebreakers gross. At the time, the second order tiebreaker was BCS standings, causing partisans for all 3 schools to openly lobby for votes. Texas Tech were a distant third in this politicking (with a BCS #7 heading into Championship Saturday), but Oklahoma successfully convinced enough human voters to rank them above Texas that the two teams traded rankings, with Oklahoma ending up BCS #2 to Texas’ #3. Oklahoma then beat Missouri in the championship game and earned their bid. Texas fans were outraged, naturally, because they had won Red River that year. They thought the Big XII should be like the SEC, which in 3-team ties used BCS standings to eliminate the lowest-ranking team and then went to head-to-head amongst the two remaining. Personally, fuck ’em. Call it Mack Brown’s karma for stealing the Rose Bowl from Cal. Live by the gladhand, die by the gladhand.

Anyway, why did it even matter which 1-loss team got the chance to win the Big XII? We already had two undefeated conference champions, Utah and Boise State! Unfortunately for those two schools, their presidents didn’t have the right friends 100 years ago, so naturally they can’t be considered for the title game. Utah at least got a BCS bowl, playing the Sugar against Alabama, who were undefeated before losing the SEC championship to Florida. They won said Sugar Bowl, finishing AP #2. Oh, but that shouldn’t count because Alabama wasn’t motivated, or something. Their controller was unplugged. There were sunspots.

In our perfect world, Utah’s undefeated record gets them not just a bid but a bye. They’re joined by those Florida Gators, and Pac-10 champs USC, who were kept out of BCS championship consideration in real life thanks to a Thursday night loss to Oregon State in Corvallis, one of those legendary, program defining upsets. The Beavs were honestly quite good at that in this era, often punking high ranked conference foes who came to Reser, and often specifically ruining USC’s season.1And a Trojan that can’t handle Beavers is a pretty major problem. Hey-oh!

Filling out the 1st round we have Texas, political losers with a big chip on their shoulders. It would be so funny to watch them hypothetically lose a second round Fiesta Bowl to Utah after all the cash shit they’d be sure to talk after their Big XII snubbing. Bama’s here next, in Nick Saban’s second year. This team started 12-0, but couldn’t quite seal the deal, falling to Florida in Atlanta. In this world maybe Saban gets a shot at redemption. Listen, an expanded field is fairer to the little guys, but unfortunately it also means the usual suspects just hang around. Nick Saban’s gonna be a near permanent fixture for the rest of this article series and we’re just gonna have to accept that.

Texas Tech are here next, a frightening air raid squad and probably the best that noted weirdo Mike Leach ever coached. In real life they got screwed by the BCS twice, kept out of the conference championship and then kept out of the BCS bowls entirely thanks to rules preventing more than 2 bids per conference. Instead of a Cotton Bowl bid2Remember, this was back when the Cotton Bowl was in the doghouse, having lost prestige after the SWC collapsed. They’d get back in the club in 2014 by selling their souls, moving the game from the Cotton Bowl to fucking Jerryworld. The only bowl game that’s any good is the Rose Bowl, all the rest are glorified NFL games. (Okay the Pop-Tart is good too, but a different kind of good) we get a playoff game in Lubbock. A win over a merely fine Ohio State team would be nearly as legendary as their earlier upset of Texas.

Penn State host the final 1st round game, champions of the Big 10. A loss at Iowa (the Oregon State of the Big 10) kept them out of BCS championship consideration, and keeps them honestly weirdly low in the BCS overall. I guess the system didn’t like the Big 10 much this year? They get to host Boise State, deeply disrespected by ranking this low. In real life they missed the BCS entirely, instead getting the pre-Christmas Poinsettia Bowl against Mountain West runner-up TCU, who were ranked #11. This game had two higher ranked teams than the actual BCS Orange Bowl, which paired #12 Cincinnati with #19 Virginia Tech, the latter only here because the ACC were Somebodies. This really kicked “hey, the BCS is rigged against smaller programs” into overdrive, starting the Mountain West’s years long campaign to get AQ status and/or expand the playoff format, so that their Utah and TCU could stop getting screwed. In a 12-team world, they still might be a little sour over lacking benefit of the doubt (why are the only 2 undefeated teams in the nation ranked #4 and #9?) but at least it’s not such a screwjob.

Honestly this year is a great argument for the 12-team system. In real life it was messy, full of politics and dumb assumptions raising endless “what-ifs”. In my world, the BCS top 12 are just our 12 teams, as Big East champ Cincinnati were genuinely the #12 team in the nation. And with Boise, TCU, and Utah all operating at full power, it’s basically inevitable that at least one of them would make a real run at some point. Maybe all the way to the gold, maybe not, but definitely enough to live forever. I’d certainly rather have that then yet another Oklahoma BCS loss. (Seriously, if you’re ever wondering “gosh, who lost that year’s BCS championship, I just can’t remember” the answer is Oklahoma. It’s always Oklahoma, they were the Bowser of the BCS.)

Also, Utah? Claim it. You finished 2008 as the only undefeated team in the nation.3Boise lost that Poinsettia Bowl to TCU You’re national champs too, and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.