Every year in college football, the topic of abandoning the bowl system in favor of a playoff tournament begins. This year is no different, but we say keep the tradition alive.

Unique

Crimson Tide Only in Division I college football is the national championship decided by a bowl system and not a postseason tournament. Having weathered storms of controvesy, it’s a unique approach that still gets millions of viewers and millions of dollars into the coffers of the schools that receive invitations to play in the big games. 

Nowhere else in sports will you find teams with identical records getting vastly different opportunities. Is it fair? If you consider strength of schedule and margin of victory, it’s more than fair. In fact, one could make the argument that it precludes a paper tiger from getting exposed on national television and turning a primetime event into a laughable mismatch. Teams like Ohio State, Florida, Miami, Oklahoma,
LSU, and Alabama, to name but a few, go to battle with similarly talented teams in their respective conferences throughout the season only to prove who is indeed worthy of playing a big time bowl game and for a national title. 

Unfair you say?

Yes, it would most certainly be unfair to let a team like Boise State, who play on a royal blue carpet, to contend for a national championship simply because they have dominated the lesser lights in the Mountain West Conference. While the Boise State Broncos are lighting up the scoreboard against players who will one day soon be occupying office cubicles, the Michigan Wolverines are taking the field against Big Ten opposition, many of whom will be patrolling the gridiron at the next level and not scanning balance sheets.

Teams from the SEC, Big Ten, PAC 12, Big 12, and even the ACC should all have first dibs on the BCS bowl games. The national champion should be determined not only by how they played but by whom they played as well. If you want to be big time, then step up to the plate and play in a big time conference, much like Boston College did when they made the move from the Big East to the ACC. 

Tradition

Rivalries are born from the womb of tradition. Familiarity breeds contempt, and you can see that manifest every time the Ohio State Buckeyes line up against their nemesis, the Michigan Wolverines. Generations of Nebraska fans mark their calendars every year when their beloved Cornhuskers meet the Sooners of Oklahoma. Alabama bleeds crimson when the Tigers of Auburn make their appearance on the schedule. Regardless of records, these games are events the likes of which are not seen in any other sport, professional or college. 

And what makes these blood feuds even more intense is when they meet in a bowl game. The neutral site only magnifies the polarity in the stadium. There may be more hits in the parking lot than on the field for these games, but nobody is complaining. The BCS bowls make for compelling theater and very rarely is there a dispute, when all is said and done, regarding who reigns supreme in college football. It’s an imprecise recipe of computer generated ratings and a selection committee who debate the delicate balance of power. At the end of the day, the two best teams during the regular season are chosen to compete for a national title. 

Though the smaller conferences are putting together better teams and recruiting more talented players than ever, they are still walking in the shadow of the game’s traditional football powerhouses. Bowl games reward schools for the caliber of competition vanquished on the field of play. It is vindication for traversing a road beset with monumental challenges, yet completing the journey with few scars, if any, to show for the peril. A playoff style tournament would confuse a great record for a great team. Give the Boise State’s and TCU’s their reward for a stellar season, but just make sure their bowl is not for the national championship.