The College Football Polls are Silly

First, let me say the Cougars do not look BCS worthy yet, the defense must improve greatly. However, they have been ranked high and the way the system is set up is that teams get ranked before they even play a game.
PHOTO Scott Winterton/DesNews
Therefore, the quandry lies in the fact that the Cougars win, they WIN, and they drop 3 spots in the AP poll? Yes, I understand the win was not as impressive as it probably should have been and the Cougars don't yet look like the next BCS buster, however, they won, albeit by one point on a last second blocked PAT. At the end of the season, if the Cougars were to run the table, there will be no asterisk by this game, it's simply a win. A few years ago, the BCS folks removed "Margin-of-Victory" from the BCS calculation formula because early season blowouts were over-valued and later in the season, top teams were tempted to run up the score so it looked better. True, I understand BYU didn't play conservative to win, they needed all they could give to get past the Huskies on Saturday ... but, dropping them three spots seems absolutely subjective (okay, again, I'm not naive, I realize the polls ARE subjective, which makes them and the determination of a national champion exactly that - SUBJECTIVE). The logic just makes no sense, let's follow the logic for a moment ...

let's suppose BYU beats UCLA in another close game that is determined in the final moments, then in October, they barely beat New Mexico and squeak by TCU, well, BYU would be sitting 8-0 and they would be out of the Top 25 because of their "close" wins ... silly, I say, just silly.

I think it happened in part because of the controversial celebration call against Jake Locker (which I agree probably should not have been called) which drew lots of national attention and the backlash hit BYU in the polls.

All in all, the system is the what it is. If BYU wants national respect, Saturday's game against UCLA is a huge hurdle to clear. More about the Cougars' 3rd matchup in 53 weeks with the Bruins later in the week. For now, let's now forget to give credit to Jan Jorgenson for coming through the Husky line and blocking the PAT attempt, 35-yard kicks are made more often than not and my guess is that they are blocked less than 5% of the time ... so hats off to the Cougar studs for getting another great block to preserve a win. This is easily the MOST overlooked aspect of the game - it was still the Cougars who blocked the kick. It wasn't the officials that stood in the way and knocked down the kick, although it should have just been a normal-length PAT. Great seasons are often full of close games that great teams find a way to win and average teams manage to lose. 2-0 under Bronco for the first time feels good, although it would have been nice to win without the negative attention thanks to the officials.