Ranking the SEC West

With the recent BCS madness, the only thing that can be said for sure about the landscape of college football this season is that the SEC Western Division is simply head and shoulders above the rest of the country. That's true for the top half of the division at least. As everyone knows, LSU, Alabama, and Arkansas checked in at 1, 2, and 3 respectively in the latest BCS poll.

While the SEC West's dominance is clear, the ranking of those top three teams is something that is not quite so clear. As it stands now, they are ranked in the correct order; however, there is one more hurdle in making the final decision. On November 25, the Friday after Thanksgiving, #1 LSU takes on #3 Arkansas in what promises to be one of the most highly anticipated games of the year. If LSU wins, then the rankings should be simple. LSU would remain #1, Alabama (assuming they take care of business against Auburn) would remain #2, and Arkansas's national championship hopes would be dashed as they would likely fall to #4 or #5.

But if Arkansas manages to invade Baton Rouge and knock off the top-ranked Tigers, chaos will rule the BCS rankings. In that case, the rankings would be open to all sorts of speculation. Would a win on the road against the #1 team in the country be enough to propel the Hogs over Alabama to take over the #1 spot or would the Crimson Tide move up to #1 and the Hogs have to settle for #2? Or would that win simply move Alabama up to #1 and drop LSU to #2, leaving Arkansas at #3? At this point, anything could happen with the BCS poll.

Furthermore, of these three teams, who would get the nod to go on to the SEC championship game to face #13 Georgia? Again, if Arkansas wins, the three teams would have identical records (11-1, 7-1), all having lost to each other (Alabama defeated Arkansas earlier this year, LSU defeated Alabama, assume Arkansas defeats LSU in 4 days). If you coached one of these teams, would you even want to go to the SEC title game? This is the only time I can ever remember that teams stand a better chance at making the national title game if they don't play in their conference championship game. For instance, if Arkansas beats LSU and Alabama goes to the SEC championship game, Arkansas would all but clinch a spot in the national championship game if they move up to #1 or #2 following the LSU game. However, Alabama would then still have to win one more game to make it to the national championship game. Very rarely does it play to a team's advantage to not win their division, but it seems that will be the case for either Alabama or Arkansas this year.

There was already a strong sentiment to create some sort of playoff system for college football before this season even began. Now, you have to believe that people will be all over the BCS voters to come up with a more effective system because one of the top three teams in the country right now will completely miss out on a BCS poll altogether, something that has been almost unheard of up to this point.