collegefbfan-8898 wrote:I am cool with that. Hey, I just watched an interesting video on YouTube about Colorado Buffaloes and the 2001 season. I knew the season ending thumping of Nebraska, but didn't know the whole deal about 9/11 messing up the game with Washington State.
So, BCS national title then. Should it have been Miami vs Oregon, Colorado, or Nebraska? It another team?
Another game that is considered a rivalry in storied terms, Miami-Nebraska, due purely to Post Season competition against each other.
You're right that the legitimacy of Nebraska's appearance in the 2001 Rose Bowl is questionable. But, to beat "them" for the title, and having a 34-0 lead at the half, was more than satisfying. Especially after hearing that Miami plays no body, doesn't deserve to be in the game, and Nebraska was going to crush the Hurricanes --- talk from the Big XII fans.
That being said; Colorado had finished the season beating #1 Nebraska, taking their place in the Big XII Championship one week later, where the Buffaloes beat #2 Texas, winning back to back games vs the #1 & #2 teams in the BCS --- they also beat #24 Colorado St, #12 Kansas St and #25 Texas A&M, in the regular season.
That certainly is credible, but Colorado's 2 losses from the regular season hurt their chances. True, one of their losses was to Texas, who they turned around and defeated for the Big Xii title. But, the loss to Fresno State in week one was too much to overcome.
Oregon would have been another credible option. They finished the season 10-1, starting the season pre-ranked #7, with a win over #22 pre-ranked Wisconsin in week one. They also had wins vs #10 Washington State & #17 UCLA.
Their drawback was losing to unranked Stanford in week 7.
Nebraska was a preseason ranked #4 team, who ran through their schedule, until they hit a wall in the last game of the year vs Colorado. The Huskers beat #15 Notre Dame and #1 Oklahoma [the defending National Champions] during the regular season.
So to peel back the layers, we have to see how the final rankings unfolded.
Here's the thing. Going into that final week, the National Championship projections, were, if Oklahoma had won out, they would play in the Big XII Championship vs Nebraska. If Oklahoma were to beat Nebraska for the Big XII title, then they would jump back up to #1. And we would have had a National title Rematch between Oklahoma & Nebraska, for a 3rd pairing between the teams in the same season --- Miami, even though they were undefeated, would have been left out of the Championship game.
Had Nebraska won the rematch vs Oklahoma for the Big XII Championship, the National title game would have been Nebraska vs Miami [which is what we got anyway]
Other teams waiting in the wings, were #3 Florida, #5 Texas and #6 Tennessee.
That's when things went sideways.
Oklahoma lost to Oklahoma State
Nebraska lost to Colorado
Miami being undefeated, took the #1 ranking.
Florida became #2, leaving them in prime position to play for the National Championship, but then lost to Tennessee.
Tennessee jumped over Texas to become the #2 team. All they needed, was to beat LSU for the SEC title, and they would play Miami for National Championship.
Championship Weekend:
Tennessee lost to LSU, leaving Texas with the chance to play for the National title
Texas lost to Colorado, leaving a mess for the BCS committee.
Now the choices were Oregon, Colorado & Nebraska.
Oregon had 1 loss to an unranked team.
Colorado had 2 losses, one of which had been avenged by beating Texas in the Big XII Championship, but the other to a non BCS conference team in Fresno State, which figure to be a final record that had 1.5 losses.
Nebraska had 1 loss to the #12 team in the BCS.
Nebraska's loss happened in the final game of the regular season, where Oregon's loss came in the middle of the year.
However, with the BCS formula, the final analysis did not use timing of loss a team suffered. It would measure every loss as a data point the same.
Colorado was bumped because of Fresno State, no question. But, Oregon being left out had to do with Stanford's lack of ranking. Even though Nebraska got obliterated by Colorado, it was 1 loss to a ranked team, so they got the benefit of the BCS system, the same way Oklahoma benefited from the BCS by playing vs LSU for the National title following the 2003 season, where the Sooners were let in, as USC was left out.
I suppose you could make an argument for any of those 3 teams. Maybe you could suggest a game between Miami & Oregon would have been more entertaining. Then again, had Colorado beaten Oregon in the Fiesta Bowl, the argument would have been, wouldn't they have.
Personally, I think it wouldn't have mattered who played against Miami in the Rose. I don't think there was a team that could have beaten the Hurricanes in the post season in 2001.
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