The first Bowl Championship Series standings came and the Badgers were not in it. The metaphorical uproar that ensued was comparable to “Jump Around.”
Wisconsin fans took to Facebook, Twitter and their rooftops alike to express their frustration at what they would call a lack of respect for the Badgers.
Their logic goes as follows: Wisconsin has two losses, one of which came via a blown game by the officials at Arizona State, the other came by seven points at No. 4 Ohio State. In their other games, the Badgers have blown every team out of the water. Should this not warrant more love from the BCS?
It shouldn’t. Here is why.
One point about the Arizona State debacle is, in the end, it was a loss. The BCS cannot and should not take into account games that teams “should” have won.
I will admit that this game was as close to a “should have won” game as I have seen in the last year or so. However, Badger fans are exaggerating how much we had that game in the bag.
If the officials had made the right calls, including a delay-of-game penalty, then Wisconsin was looking at a 27-yard field goal to win 33-32.
This is far from a guarantee. Redshirt junior kicker Kyle French would have had to make that very high pressure field goal in a hostile environment at night. By the way, he was 5-8 on the season, missed one extra point and will not be playing with Wisconsin for his senior season.
The second argument said Wisconsin lost on the road to No. 4 Ohio State by only seven points.
To repeat myself, this is also, regardless of how close, still a loss.
OSU is a good team. They deserve credit for winning the games on their schedule. But the pressure of having nothing to play for last season due to Bowl bans cannot go unaccounted for when mentioning their perfect record.
The Buckeyes are not one of the top teams in the country. If they played Florida State or Alabama... I won’t even go there.
Ohio State is ranked No. 15 in defense and No. 20 in offense for yards allowed and gained respectively. Statistics do not tell the whole story, but they are hardly in favor of OSU. If a potential Bowl matchup with Oregon or Stanford awaits, look for the Buckeyes to struggle.
The last discernible reason for Badger fan frustration regards the presence of three other two-loss teams, No. 13 LSU, No. 16 Texas A&M and No. 22 South Carolina being in the BCS standings.
To be clear: The SEC has to play each other, and the Big Ten gets to play each other.
Comparing the Big Ten to the SEC in football is absurd. Since agreeing to set up three matchups each Jan. 1, the SEC is 7-2 against the Big Ten. In those seven wins, SEC teams won by an average of 19.4 points per game.
Making the very safe assumption that LSU will beat Furman this weekend and a less safe assumption that they will lose to Alabama the next week, LSU would be 6-3. If Wisconsin beats BYU after their bye week, they would be 6-2. Do I think the Tigers should still be ranked ahead of the Badgers? Absolutely.
The SEC deserves the benefit of the doubt. Despite losing to each other, their quality depth and recent inter-conference dominance gives them that at least.
Making three straight Rose Bowls is impressive for the Badgers, but losing all three does not serve the Big Ten’s image well.
The season is not over. In the past two weeks, 16 ranked teams have lost. If the Badgers do not become one of those teams and win their remaining games, they will certainly be ranked by the end of the year, which is when it really matters anyway.
If you think the Badgers are getting disrespected in the polls, let Jonah know why and email sports@dailycardinal.com. Jonah would also like to wish his mother a happy belated birthday.
