Big Wins Should Buoy Auburn, Wisconsin In BCS Standings

The winners of the big afternoon games may be the big winners in the BCS standings this week.

Auburn’s 24-17 stampeding of LSU solidifies the Tigers as the SEC’s strongest BCS candidate, and leaves just Alabama and the SEC East champion as looming hurdles on the Tigers’ path to a BCS Championship Game berth. If Cam Newton’s squad can go undefeated, their strength of schedule, which will only get better, all but assures them of a title shot.

Meanwhile, LSU’s loss likely not only rules the Tigers out of the national title race, but makes being the SEC’s at-large BCS team very difficult. They should fall behind Alabama in the pecking order after today’s defeat, and will have to take down the Crimson Tide at home in two weeks to shuffle the deck back in their favor.

And as for Wisconsin, their thrilling 31-30 win over Iowa will probably move the Badgers up in the Big Ten’s order, perhaps past Ohio State, but it doesn’t help the Badgers’ chances of winning the Big Ten. That’s because the only Big Ten team that remains undefeated, Michigan State, already won its game against Wisconsin.

So the Badgers must hope for Iowa to upset the Spartans next week to get back in the Big Ten title race. (Iowa, meanwhile, could cause a little chaos with a win over Sparty, and will need that win to have any shot at a BCS bowl.) Otherwise, Wisconsin’s chances at a BCS bowl berth are more or less a coin flip: will bowl committees take the Badgers, who haven’t been BCS fixtures of late, over the Buckeyes, who always travel well?