[NU Sports] Maybe the Big Ten ...

[JHCCLARK at aol.com]

"Dennis W. Brandt" <tbng at comcast.net> writes:

"One announcer made an excellent point over the weekend.  Why should Ohio State get a pass because it ended its season three weeks?  Missouri, with the same record, was forced to play an additional game which, if they lost, knocks them out of any possibiltiy of playing for the national title.   That is, of course, what happened..."

I have heard that from Beano Cook all year long (that, plus his whining that the Big Ten doesn't play a 9-game conference schedule).  No-one irritates me more than he because, even though people have explained this to him time after time, he just doesn't get that (a) an odd-numbered set of teams cannot play an odd-numbered set of games (we can play an 8- or a 10-game conference schedule, not a 9-game conference schedule), and (b) if you believe that playing a conference championship game is a net negative, THEN DON'T PLAY IT.

There is nothing in the NCAA rules that mandates that a 12-team conference MUST separate into divisions and MUST play a championship game.  The ACC, SEC, Big XII, Conference USA and MAC play those championship games because they make money.  Those conference schools either need to stop whining (along with Beano) or stop playing the extra game.   WE didn't force them to do so, so it is NOT our fault.

By the way, playing that game helped LSU, right?  A season-ending win over Tennessee vaulted it over Georgia (as opposed to ending its season with a loss at home to Arkansas, which sunk it below Georgia).