Okay, forget everything I've ever said here about the BCS and the virtues of the old bowl system. I don't need to see the Big-10 play the Pac-10 in the Rose Bowl, I don't care that the Fiesta Bowl isn't really a major bowl, and I don't care if they ever play the Cotton Bowl again.
Twenty-four hours after the barn-burner that went down in Pasadena last night, I'm sure of one thing: if I can get a game like that even once a decade, I'm ready to bow down at the altar of the BCS and kiss the toes of Lee Corso while I'm at it.
While there have been numerous criticisms thrown towards USC coach Pete Carroll, I can't go along with any of it. Alright, you can argue that maybe he should've punted the ball instead of going for it on fourth down, and you can wonder why he had a Heisman trophy winner standing on the sidelines during the most important play of the season, but I keep thinking of one thing: how can you really second-guess a man who has built the best team any of us will probably ever see?
This Trojan team won thirty-four straight games playing under rules specifically designed to make dominance like that impossible. It featured an offense in which one Heisman Trophy winner (Matt Leinart) regularly handed the ball off to another (Reggie Bush). The team somehow ignored the pressure of its crown completely, showing uncommon resilience when the streak looked certain to die in the desert of Tempe, Arizona, the hallowed ground of South Bend, Indiana, or even on their own home turf at the unlikely hands of upstart Fresno State.
You simply cannot criticize the architect of this team. When he chose to go for that first down, gambling just as he had at South Bend, he was betting on his team, showing complete faith in an offensive line that had been dominant throughout the second half as Lendale White pummelled the Longhorns time after time. (Okay, one quibble: I agree with the choice to run White, but wouldn't Reggie Bush at least made for a nice decoy on the play?)
And if you criticize Carroll's decision and attempt to lay this loss at his feet, maybe you didn't notice that Texas quarterback Vince Young laid down what must be the greatest individual performance in the history of college football, no hyperbole required. Remember when you used to play touch football in the street and the older kid who lived around the corner would play quarterback for both sides but wouldn't be allowed to run past the line of scrimmage because no one would have a shot at catching him? Well, that was Vince Young last night, except he broke the rules all night long.
When the dust had finally cleared a few minutes after Young's last-minute fourth-down touchdown changed the course of college football history and likely sent the entire state of Texas into a state of shock, all Young did was hand the ball to the nearest official and walk back to the huddle for the two-point conversion. No celebration? Perhaps because the numbers spoke for themselves: 267 yards passing, 200 yards rushing, three touchdowns, one national championship.
How great was this game? Even as the Longhorns took that final three-point lead with only nineteen seconds left on the clock, you still believed that that it wasn't over. Maybe Reggie Bush would settle under the kickoff and take it to the house. If not, maybe Matt Leinart would find Dwayne Jarrett streaking down a sideline for six. In the end, though, as the game ended with an incomplete pass, it didn't really matter.
And believe it or not, we have the BCS to thank.
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