Cupcake R Us - The sad truth about college football

From ESPN - Maisel: I-Formation - College Football: "No Accidental Tourists " - As you wait to hear where your bowl team will play this season, keep in mind that the first task of any bowl is not to reward your team. The first task is to sell its tickets, and the second task is to fill its hotel rooms. That's why the loser of the ACC Championship Game may be passed over by the Gator Bowl, which is wary that any school's fans will want to make two trips to Jacksonville a month apart. That's why, despite my projection, the Music City Bowl may not take Wake Forest, which played at Vanderbilt last Saturday. That's why, again despite my projection, the Fiesta Bowl may not select Arizona State. The local team doesn't fill hotels and restaurants for several days before the game. Playoffs are about championships. Bowls are about tourism.

This unfortunate truth is the first pitiful point about what may be America's most popular sport. Other pitiful points to follow...

Also from ESPN: Ohio State hasn't played a game since Nov. 17. It lost its final regular season home game to Illinois. But thanks to some timely upsets, the Buckeyes are back in the BCS title picture.

What the hell? But it's true. Ohio State doesn't have to play a conference championship and ends its season playing one less game than REAL football conferences, like the SEC and the Big 12. And ends on a losing note, to boot. But, if Oklahoma beats Missouri in the Big 12 Championship, then Ohio State will play West Virginia for the National Championship. Someone explain this. And, while you're at it, explain why Georgia, despite not winning enough games to get into the SEC Championship, is poised to get a BCS wild card berth? At least Hawai'i, the only undefeated team in Division I football, is poised to play LSU in a BCS game. That's the only fair thing I see. Sadly, or perhaps because I'm a slave to tradition, I expect LSU to crucify the little Warriors. But maybe they won't.

Here's what Kirk Herbstreit from ESPN has to say about Ohio State sitting by while other teams PUT Ohio State in the position it is in today: In my opinion, Ohio State could do more about [improving] the image people have of its program by playing a talented USC team that right now is as hot as any in the country … I promise you, if Ohio State goes into the Rose Bowl, everyone is going to be saying, 'USC is going to kill Ohio State.' … Ohio State will gain more respect if it plays USC in the Rose Bowl and wins that game, than if it goes and beats West Virginia and wins the national title. From an image standpoint, Ohio State would score more points going to the Rose Bowl than by going to the national championship game. If you can believe that, that's the truth.

And what does Bruce Hooley have to say about the whole damned mess: Lately...the Buckeyes have been even better on the sofa than they were earlier this year on the road. With no discernable pulse in the national championship race even after its dominant win in Ann Arbor two weeks ago; OSU has since gone from cadaver to contender, shedding its toe tag for a stand-by ticket to New Orleans.

Hooley on the Ohio State coach sitting home watching television on Thanksgiving while other coaches were on the field playing football: The fact that Tressel had time to juggle his remote control while other coaches were doing what they're paid handsomely to do is a wishbone stuck sideways in some craws.

Jack Nicklaus, an Ohio State man, once said major championships were often easier to win than regular tournaments because the enormity of the stakes caused others to wilt under final-round pressure he conditioned himself to withstand.

So, by finishing its season Nov. 17, were the Buckeyes effectively allowed to play rounds three and four of The Masters on Friday, thus avoiding the college football equivalent of Amen Corner on Sunday at Augusta?

Hooley on Ohio State's schedule: At home in nonconference games, OSU played Division I-AA Youngstown State, Akron and Kent State, a trio which left critics wanting to do just what the helmet logo of those three schools suggests: Y-A-K.

A road trip to Washington (4-8) hasn't done much to silence charges the Buckeyes ordered four wins from Cupcakes R' Us.

Most years, OSU would have received a bump from its Big Ten brethren.

But this year, outside of Columbus, the Big Ten smelled like a fish market after the ice melted.

Supposed national powers Penn State, Wisconsin and Michigan folded like Third World military juntas, leaving Ohio State without a single top 20 opponent on its regular-season schedule for the first time since 1936.

How other conferences view those without playoffs: ...Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops has criticized the inequity of some leagues playing a title game others don't face.

"I'm sure Missouri would rather be sitting where Ohio State is, not having to deal with it," Stoops said Monday. "We're not all playing on the same field."

If the Sooners defeat Missouri on Saturday in San Antonio, and if West Virginia handles Pittsburgh, the two leagues that will put teams in the BCS title game will be the Big East and the Big Ten -- two of the three leagues among the six BCS conferences not to have postseason title games.

Whitecrow