BCS Rankings: Initial Analysis Of The Week 10 BCS Standings

A quick review of the results of the in Week 10 BCS rankings:

Oregon wresting the top spot from Auburn isn’t surprising, and doesn’t matter. Both teams will be in the BCS Championship Game if they win out, and it doesn’t much matter which one would head into that game ranked first. This is a laurel for Oregon’s papers to talk about this week, and little more.

The gap between those two teams and TCU and Boise State, though, is telling. Almost six-tenths of a point separates second-ranked Auburn and third-ranked TCU, and while that gap will narrow after TCU plays Utah this week — provided the Horned Frogs win — Auburn would just widen it again with games against Alabama and the SEC East champion. For TCU or Boise State to play for a national championship this year, more than one of Oregon, Auburn, and Alabama must lose.

It’s nice to see three teams from non-BCS automatic qualifier conferences in the top five, but because of the way the BCS rules work, that will probably only reward one of those three teams. The eventual reward for the highest-ranked of those three teams, should Oregon meet the SEC champion in the BCS Championship Game, is a Rose Bowl berth, which isn’t shabby. But it’s not the same as a shot at a title.