Bowl Predictions for the Pac 10
Thursday, November 8th, 2007 at 9:04 am in
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UCLA, bowl matchups, Rose Bowl.
OK, it took a while, but I finally was able to get a handle on this Hotline item, which should have been up yesterday but wasn’t for various reasons — the primary one being the sheer size and scope of it.
I wanted to focus on three entities whose situations are intertwined: the Pac-10, BCS and Rose Bowl. But there’s so much to write about, so many permutations, that I had trouble narrowing my approach — so much trouble that I ultimately didn’t narrow it.
This thing RAM-bles.
The projections themselves are at the bottom. Most of the post deals with the bowl selection procedures, bowl options, bowl eligibility and that kind of thing.
I’m sure I’ve left some stuff out — what, exactly, I’m not sure. I could have written twice as much and not covered everything.
So … if you manage to get through this and still have questions, put them on the comment boards and I’ll address them next week, if not sooner.
Here we go:
*** Two teams control their own destiny in the Pac-10: Oregon and, amazingly enough, UCLA. If the Bruins win out — lemme know when you stop laughing — they’ll finish with two losses and would have beaten any/all the teams they’d be tied with.
Since UCLA has ASU, Oregon and USC left on the schedule, there’s a better chance the Bruins will go 0-3 than 3-0, but I had to mention the control-your-own-destiny situation.
ASU, USC and Cal can all still win the league, but they need help — Cal more than either of the others.
The Bears must win out and hope they finish in a multi-team tie not involving Oregon but in which no one has a head-to-head advantage. In that situation, the second tiebreaker would come into play: record against the other teams in descending order.
If Oregon is sitting there right below the tied teams — and Cal beat Oregon — the Bears would likely have the advantage over the teams they were tied with.
*** The key to decoding the Pac-10 bowl picture is Arizona State-USC. The winner, if it doesn’t lose elsewhere, will finish 11-1/10-2 (ASU) or 10-2 (USC) and almost assuredly be BCS-bound.
USC/ASU could be a BCS automatic (as the league champ) or a BCS at-large team (if Oregon wins the title).
USC/ASU would go to the
Rose Bowl if Oregon jumps into the national title game or another BCS bowl (probably the Fiesta) if the Ducks are in the Rose Bowl as the league champ.
If the league gets a second BCS team, then it would have seven bowl slots to fill, which brings me to ….
*** There’s a decent great chance the Pac-10 will not have enough 7-win teams to fill its slots and perhaps not even enough 6-win teams, either.
USC, ASU and Oregon have already gotten to seven, and you figure Cal will win one of its last three to get there, too.
UCLA, Oregon State and Washington (because it plays 13 games) are the only other teams capable of winning seven.
It seems unlikely that the Huskies (3-6) will run the table. And given UCLA’s performance of late, it’s hard to envision the Bruins (5-4) taking two of three from ASU, Oregon and USC.
That leaves OSU (5-4), which has an injured quarterback and dates with Washington, WSU and Oregon. Sure, they could win two of three, but the Beavers could just as easily lose two of three.
If they do lose twice, and if UCLA and Washington stumble as expected, the Pac-10 will be left with just four teams with seven wins — and very possibly seven slots to fill.
Under the above scenarios, OSU won’t have seven, but the Beavers should get to six. UCLA could, as well, which would give the league six teams for the seven slots.
If Arizona (4-6) or Stanford (3-6) wins out, then the league would get its seventh, but don’t count on it.
*** If Oregon jumps into the BCS Championship title game and there’s a one- or two-loss Pac-10 in the at-large pool — again, it would have to be USC or ASU — then it’s a slam dunk lock that the Rose Bowl would take that Pac-10 team.
The bowl wouldn’t be bound to do it by BCS rules, but there’s no way to overstate the depth of the relationship between the Rose Bowl and the Pac-10.
They want each other, every year.
Bowl officials would love 10-2 USC or 11-1/10-2 Arizona State, although they would not want to match USC against Michigan — a rematch of last year’s game and a “collision” of teams that lost to Appalachian State and Stanford, respectively.
And if the Ducks don’t jump into the BCS, the Rose would not want to match Oregon against Michigan, a rematch of the Ducks’ 39-7 win earlier this season. (It might have to, if UM wins the Big Ten and Oregon doesn’t make the BCS title game.)
Basically, the Rose doesn’t want Michigan.
*** Also central to decoding the BCS situation is the order of selection of at-large teams.
If a bowl loses its anchor (or “host”) school to the BCS title game, it has first choice of the at-large candidates.
(Anchor conferences are: Pac-10 and Big Ten champs in the Rose Bowl; SEC champ in the Sugar; Big 12 champ in the Fiesta; ACC champ in the Orange.)
If two bowls lose their anchors to the title game, they would have the first and second picks of at-large teams, the bowl that lost the No. 1 team picking first.
After the bowl(s) replace teams lost to the title game, the selection order goes as follows this season: Orange, Fiesta, Sugar.
Here’s how this issue relates to the Pac-10: If Oregon jumps into the BCS title game as No. 1 or 2, then the Rose would have the first or second pick of at-large teams and would, most likely, jump on the chance to take 11-1/10-2 ASU or 10-2 USC.
If the Rose loses both Oregon and Ohio State to the BCS title game, it would have the first two picks of the at-large teams. (It could not take another bowl’s anchor.)
So let’s run that scenario quickly: Ohio State and Oregon finish No. 1 and 2 and head to the BCS title game.
The Rose would surely pick 11-1/10-2 ASU or 10-2 USC (if either is available) and then match that team against — I’m just guessing here — Oklahoma/Texas/SEC No. 2/Big East champ.
It would all depend, of course, on the matchups and the records of the teams available.
You can bet your last dollar that if given the choice, the Rose would want a one-loss team from another conference ahead of a two-loss team — the only exception in my mind would be Oklahoma.
I’d imagine Oregon-Oklahoma would have some appeal.
*** There is a nightmare scenario for the Rose Bowl, which I’ll cover briefly:
Oregon and Ohio State jump into the BCS title game and no other Pac-10 teams are BCS-eligible — not an unreasonable scenario.
If Cal beats USC, the Trojans would have no chance to finish in the at-large pool. And then if USC turns around and KOs Arizona State, the Sun Devils might not have the time or schedule strength left to climb back into the top-14.
In that case, with no Pac-10 or Big Ten teams available, then the Rose would have to pick two at-large teams from conference on the other side of the country.
West Virginia-Kansas, anyone?
*** Now, for the BCS projections.
I’m going to assume the following conference champs:
Oklahoma in the Big 12, Boston College in the ACC, West Virginia in the Big East, LSU in the SEC, Oregon in the Pac-10 and Ohio State in the Big Ten (meaning Michigan would not be available for at-large consideration).
I’ll also assume the following at-large teams: USC, Big 12 No. 2, SEC No. 2, Hawaii.
In selection order, here’s what happens:
BCS Championship title game: Ohio State vs. LSU.
Rose Bowl Gets Oregon as Pac-10 champ and fills Ohio State’s anchor spot with one-loss West Virginia.
Sugar Bowl: Fills LSU’s anchor spot with Georgia.
Orange Bowl : Gets Boston College as ACC champ and uses No. 1 at-large pick on one-loss Kansas (which would bring the entire city of Lawrence).
Fiesta Bowl: Gets Oklahoma as Big 12 champ and uses No. 2 at-large pick on USC. (Fiesta officials party all night.)
Sugar Bowl: Already has Georgia and uses No. 3 at-large pick on Hawaii, the last team available.
*** So let’s assume the Pac-10 gets two teams in the BCS. Let’s also assume that UCLA doesn’t turn things around and loses two of its final three.
And since I need to pick a winner of the ASU-USC game for the purposes of bowl projections, I’m going with the Trojans.
At this point, the bowl projections would be as follows:
Rose: Oregon
Sugar: USC
Holiday: ASU
Sun: Cal
Emerald: Oregon State
Las Vegas: UCLA
Armed Forces: Stanford/Arizona/Washington/unfilled
I think that’s it for now. Expect thing to change this weekend, perhaps dramatically.
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