The chilly breeze made us shiver while we made our way to the stadium. We passed by waves of people in orange and white with black and gold people hovering in between. We had landed in Nashville, Tenn. the day before, and my family waited with excitement for our first Southeastern Conference (SEC) football game together.
Thanksgiving Break allowed for a quick trip to a southern paradise. Vanderbilt was playing Tennessee at home, and we could feel the excitement and passion in the air even the day before.
When we finally made our way to the game, we saw men dressed in costumes and women holding babies in Tennessee Volunteer suspenders composing a veritable sea of orange.
The Tennessee band must have played the song “Rocky Top” a thousand times as we packed ourselves into the tiny stadium like a group of sardines.
We sat surrounded by Tennessee fans and listened as they chanted songs in perfect unison, as thousands of voices rose out of the quaint stadium. People have a deep passion for college football and hold love for the team that represents their state, home and culture.
This great passion comes from the tradition associated with NCAA football, and this tradition makes the game so important to so many different people of all backgrounds.
It’s hard to explain the feeling behind college football. Many people have a burning passion for their favorite team that lingers until they die. The games, matchups, competitive spirit and passionate play make college football a sensational viewing experience.
Although games come and go, the tradition of NCAA football lives on forever, and its preservation makes the tradition all the more special. Although governed by tradition, the BCS has decided to stray from its traditional mode of determining a champion.
Throughout the years, college football has determined a champion through a computerized program that calculates the results based on statistics like wins, losses, points scored, strength of schedule and so on. This system created a significant amount of public dissent in the belief that certain teams did not deserve to be ranked where they were.
Starting this year, the BCS has implemented a selection committee that subjectively chooses teams based on their personal perceptions. With the old computer processing system of selection, the picks for the BCS championship were objective and based solely on statistics.
The selection committee, although attempting to place unbiased members at the helm, can develop certain biases and base its picks on members’ own inherent preferences. The committee is flawed because it has been told not to select the teams it thinks should go, but who it thinks is the best at the moment. This can exclude teams who may be undefeated, such as Florida State and lower their position because of the way they’re playing currently.
This year, hopeful fans of teams like TCU, Arizona, Baylor and Florida State may be disappointed by the committee’s selections, as all have built worthy resumes, but perhaps only one or two will be selected for a playoff bid.
Although teams may not be playing their best toward the end of the season, that does not mean they don’t have the capabilities to be great and to beat top tier teams.
The committee must choose the four best overall teams to play each other in the national championship while paying attention to specific wins and margins of victory. It needs to prove that subjectivity can work.
Although people have spoken of the absolute need for a college playoff, the widespread passion of millions of people has come from the traditional aspects of the game.
This stray from tradition will likely be forgotten a few years down the road, but for now at least the institution of such a significant new rule will cause a fair amount of vocal public backlash.
