We all know by this point what should happen in the BCS come Sunday night. Here are a few sites that are all projecting the same matchups in the five BCS Bowl games.
However, I've come up with 10 questions that may get you thinking otherwise.
The first three are listed here with more to come!
1) What if Oklahoma State Destroys Oklahoma?
This is the burning question among most of the “experts” out there. Would Oklahoma State warrant jumping Alabama in the BCS Standings with an impressive win over Oklahoma? With this win I would expect OSU to be the #2 ranked team in all the computers. This would happen because Oklahoma is currently the 5th ranked team in the computers and a victory over them would sure help the ranking.
With being ranked #2 in the computers, OSU would just need for about 1/3 of the voters to select them ahead of Alabama on their ballots. I am really convinced that this is a possibility. Ten percent of the voters already don’t have Alabama as the number #2 team and I think a big win by the Cowboys and the desire for there to not be a rematch could increase to the needed number of around 33%.
Still, it is important to note that Oklahoma State would also need to jump Stanford and Virginia Tech. If they remain behind those two teams in some of the polls, I would say that they would need to be ranked #2 in upwards of 50% of the polls.
2) What if LSU loses a close one to Georgia?
While I think this is very unlikely, it could happen; and, remember that Georgia is probably the 3rd best team in the SEC right now. The biggest impact of this result would be in the computers. The most likely scenario would be for OSU to jump both LSU and Alabama and get the #1 computer vote (assuming a win over Oklahoma). LSU would most likely fall to #2 and Alabama would fall to #3. This would make it much easier for OSU to jump Alabama and would just require a little love from the voters.
The bigger question here is how would the voters end up voting? Who would receive the #1 votes in the polls? Would Oklahoma State be worthy of any #1 votes? If I were a voter, I would have a hard time ranking Alabama ahead of LSU because of the fact that LSU was required to play an extra game just because they beat Alabama. I would also have a hard time keeping LSU at #1. I think a loss to Georgia would expose both LSU and Alabama and should make some of the voters think about that #1 spot. In the end I don’t think the polls would chance much and would hope that the voters would not punish LSU with a close loss to a good team.
I would expect LSU to remain #1 in the polls and be followed by Alabama. Stanford, Virginia Tech and Oklahoma State would be very closely bunched at #s 3, 4 and 5. Because of the way the BCS works, being ranked ahead of another team doesn’t really matter if you are close in votes.
It would come down to the computers and like I said above Oklahoma State would be ranked #1 and would have a good chance of jumping into the National Title Game. I think this is the best case to avoid a rematch.
3) What if Oklahoma State loses?
This would be an interesting scenario. I don’t think that Stanford would warrant being voted ahead of Alabama because they would not have won their conference and I don’t think Virginia Tech could beat out Alabama in the computers. In the end I think this means we are most certainly headed for a rematch.
Even if LSU were to lose to Georgia, I don't think it would matter. LSU and Alabama would maintain their ranking at #1 and #2 and Stanford and Virginia Tech will not have the computer ranking numbers to jump either of the SEC schools.
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