The top 2 teams in the land have arrived in New Orleans, where on Monday January 9th they will clash heads in a rematch of their scintillating (cue the sarcasm) Game of the Century: a bone-crushing 9-6 offensive shootout, which sent offense back to the 40’s (hey look, there’s Tim Tebow and the Broncos!)

And while ESPN has the hype train rolling, trying to build anticipation for a game that only the analysts seemed to want, it’s hard to get jacked up for two teams that we’ve already seen.  Like that terrible old MTV reality show, Next, we’d like to stick this matchup back on the bus and try again.  But it’s what we’re stuck with, so what the heck.

After 4 BCS bowl games of pure, unadulterated offensive explosion, the final game of the 2011 college football season will be settled by two powerful defenses.  The two offenses were invited to come along, but they had to find their own ride, because it’s been the D that’s carried both of these teams to the last step.

So no, the 308 combined points we’ve seen in the Rose, Fiesta, Sugar, and Orange (West Virginia just scored again!) will make the BCS Championship game look like the ugly duckling, but in a strange way, after the video game numbers we’ve been seeing, it might actually be — wait for it, wait for it, refreshing to see some real defense.  The 77 total points average per game is likely to be significantly lower when the Tide and Tigers meet for a second time, even if the two offenses have had a month to prepare (which they have).

We know the Tigers deserve their #1 spot, and the bowl season has only further cemented that lofty notion:

Just look at that schedule and drool over the remarkable strength of teams that LSU has plowed through.

Oregon just won the Rose Bowl.  West Virginia just won the Orange Bowl.  Mississippi State won the Music City Bowl. Florida won the Gator Bowl. Auburn won the ChicFilABowl. Alabama is in the national championship, Arkansas plays Kansas State in the Cotton Bowl tonight, and Georgia lost an epic 3 OT thriller to Michigan State in the Outback Bowl.

Which means of the 13 teams LSU played this year:

- 5 teams won their bowl game (2 won a BCS game)
-  1 lost their bowl game (Georgia)
- 1 plays tonight (Arkansas)
- 5 of their opponents failed to make a bowl game (Northwestern St, Kentucky, Tennessee, Western Kentucky, and Ole Miss).

If Arkansas wins tonight, LSU can lay claim to beating 3 of the AP’s final top 5.  That’s insane.

And that’s before LSU even takes the field.

That said it’s hard to argue — even with a loss — that anyone was better than LSU this year. The voters are going to have quite the dilemna if the Tide pull off the win.

MITCH BLATT

After the Alabama Crimson Tide lost to the South Carolina Gamecocks in their third straight game against top twenty opponents, the question of the day was, “Where will Alabama be ranked?”

Well, now that question is settled. The new polls are out and Alabama is #8 in both the AP Poll and the Coaches Poll. The question is funny, because in fact, neither ranking matters. The question itself is irrelevant.

We know that a lot of the teams ahead of Alabama will lose, and some of those teams (four top 10 teams come from the SEC right now) will face off against each other. There is scientific proof that a number of those teams will lose. Oklahoma (#6, AP) and Nebraska (#5) will face each other in the Big 12 Championship assuming they remain undefeated in regular season play.  Auburn, Alabama, LSU, and South Carolina (spots 7-10 respectively) will continue to face their tough SEC schedules and only one will emerge as the South Eastern Conference champion. Essentially one of those teams–assuming that team has only one loss at the end of the year–will be in the position that Alabama is in now: an SEC team with one loss.

If a team finishes the regular season undefeated in a BCS conference, they essentially earn their right to play for a national championship. Though their have been some omissions. Ohio State and Oregon are in the drivers seat right now after Alabama lost their pole position. An undefeated Pac-10 champ would certainly earn the right ahead of a one-loss SEC champ in Alabama.

But the whole question of Alabama ignores the two remaining undefeated SEC teams: LSU and Auburn. Both undefeated and if either of them finishes the season perfect in the SEC, of course they should (and probably would) make the National Title Game ahead of Oregon.

Non BCS hopefuls Boise State, TCU, and, quite likely, Utah, will end the season undefeated, but a team like Boise State whose best strength-of-schedule match-up (Virginia Tech) lost to James Madison isn’t playing the same game as Alabama, which faced Arkansas, Florida, and South Carolina back-to-back-to-back and still has LSU and Auburn left.

To put the SEC in perspective, whichever team wins the SEC, considering Alabama, LSU, Auburn and South Carolina are the contenders, will have played at least two of each other during the regular season and again in the championship.

Photo: Getty

SCOTT JACOBS

Long after Tim Tebow’s tears were wiped away, along with his Heisman hopes, Texas played against Nebraska (as a two touchdown favorite I might add) with a national championship berth on the line.  That was the assumption at least.  Afterall, the way this season had played up until that point, the stars had aligned for Texas to play the winner of the SEC Championship.  It was practically scripted.  And with Texas getting a raw deal last year at the last moment and getting jumped by an Oklahoma team that they had already beaten for the title game in South Florida, the presumption was that they would not get shut out two years in a row.

But not so fast.  After an unimpressive showcase of ineptness most of the game, Texas overcame some baffling mistakes and kicked their way to a Big 12 championship.  But just because they’re number three, and next in line after Florida lost, shouldn’t immediately mean that they should go to the championship.  Playing for a title is not a right, it’s a privilege, and the question voters should be asking themselves tonight is: does Texas deserve to play for all the Roses (and then some)?

The odds on likelihood is that they will get the nod.  The reason for this is twofold: number one, Texas is still undefeated, and number two, they got shafted last year.  But they overwhelmed no one tonight, and they’re not the only undefeated team left.

Far from it.

Cincinnati and TCU were licking their chops as Texas fell behind with less than two minutes to go.  They must have burrowed their head in nausea when the Huskers inexplicably kicked the ball out of bounds and then garnered a horse collar tackle on top of a huge gain.

Texas won.  Yes.  But barely.  McCoy almost made the gaffe of the century when he lost track of time, and heaved the ball out of bounds casually.  That’s how I feel the title game will play out.  The voters will put Texas at number 2 lazily, because that’s the easy thing to do.  Who has the guts to go with the best resume?  Who I ask who?

This is the big problem.  Texas has history, tradition, and is well recognized as a football power.  They were number two to start the year.  TCU?  They were 17th in both polls to start out.  Cincinnati?  Unranked entirely.

Look, I love polls.  I think college football isn’t the same without them. We love numbers in this nation.  We eat them up.  Numbers help make things make sense.  Numbers rile up hype, numbers give us grounds to compare things against, numbers help us determine a national champion.

It’s just unfortunate when those numbers have such bearing months and months later.

The order going into today’s games:  Texas, TCU, Cincinnati.  Nothing has changed.  The only difference is Texas actually took a step back, while TCU flew up 13 spots, and as for Cincy, well they came out of nowhere (despite being in the Orange Bowl the year before) to crash the BCS title game debate.

If you throw out numbers, and conference affiliations and all that jazz and just compare the three teams side by side, as if it was a Coke-Pepsi taste test, it’s hard to see how anyone goes with Texas.  Their wins over ranked teams:  Oklahoma State, which was shellacked and shut out at Oklahoma with a Fiesta Bowl bid on the line, and Nebraska, which snuck in at number 22, just to make them a little more imposing.

Texas has the weakest resume of those three, but again, they’re Texas.

I don’t feel like throwing numbers at you.  Look it up if you want.  But Texas shouldn’t get in because they’re Texas.  People have to have some imagination.  This was a down year for the Big12.  The Big East is given no respect, and TCU, what conference do they play in again?

I don’t know who should go to the title game.  The obvious solution is an 8 team playoff.  But there are no signs that will ever happen.  So the only P word I’ll throw out there is preposterous.  It’s preposterous that Texas should get to go the title game just because they are who they are.

It’s like that line from Knocked Up, “life doesn’t care about your plans.”  Just because Texas beat an anemic Nebraska offense by a point, doesn’t mean they should automatically move up.  Cincy won in the snow, over a top 15 team.  Texas squeaked by a team that barely attained 100 yards of total offense.  TCU’s resume speaks for itself.

But tradition is everything in college football.  It’s why the big wigs at the top were so reluctant all these years to let one of the teams outside the Big Boy table (the big 6) play in their BCS bowl games.  It’s the reason that many would object to a TCU in the national title game.  It’s the logic that explains why Boise State has to try scheduling more elite schools if they want to even crack the discussion.

Cincinnati is not only getting overlooked, they’re getting attention for all the wrong reasons.  While Brian Kelly plays hush, hush with the media about his (cough, cough) interest in the Notre Dame opening, his Bearcats find themselves undefeated and Big East champs.  Instead of fielding questions about the incredible comeback his team put together, he was sidestepping questions about South Bend.

It’s a slap in the face to an incredible year for the Cats, who do play in a power 6 conference.  But ya sure as heck woudn’t know it.  Cincy doesn’t have that tradition or those incredible alumni players who went on to big things in the NFL.  If Pitt was in their shoes, I’d argue the Panthers get a lot more love.  Why, because Pitt has that history and tradition on their side, even if it hasn’t been recently.

Alabama proved they should be in the title game with their demolition derby over the Crying Tebows, err… Florida.  They won on a neutral field in dominant fashion.  Texas did anything but.  But they’re Texas, and when we wake up tomorrow they’ll most likely be number two in the polls.  And on Fox’s BCS selection special, that little Longhorn emblem that is so synonymous with college football glory, will appear on your screen, next to the well known A of Alabama’s.

Texas-Alabama just looks good.  It sounds good.  Two historic programs with huge fan bases facing off in Pasadena?  Mmmm… delicious.  And the last time Texas went to a California bowl game, they won the national championship in one of the most exciting games ever played.  How do you go against that for a team like TCU or Cincy?  Ratings wise, Texas-Bama will score high marks.  On paper it looks like a great matchup.

Whether or not it is the right matchup for the national title, well, that’s obsolete.  It’s what we’ll be getting.  Sex sells in advertising.  Tradition sells in college football.

Life isn’t fair.  Neither is college football.

SCOTT JACOBS

There’s a reason people love college football.  Say what you want about the playoff system or lack of one in the game, but college football purists have always argued that what makes their game unique is the added importance to a regular season that usually leaves minimal room for error, and lots of room for good, pure chaos.

But that seems to be abscent from the game this year.  Unless of course you consider the wild situation shaping up in the Pac10 where four plus teams seem to still have a crack at a Rose Bowl berth.  But that’s not what we’re driving at.

What happened to the week by week wild top 10 showcases, the games that could completely turn the college football world on its head.  What happened to the Texas Tech’s of the world?  Teams that sort of came out of nowhere to shock the world.  While we’re making Big12 references what about Kansas and Missouri?  What happened to games like those?  Games that showed up on the schedule at the end of the year, but all of a sudden merited the entire nation’s attention.

This season has been by all accounts, boring, predictable, and a bump-free ride to a seemingly foregone conclusion.  Florida and Alabama have drudged through the once again mediocre SEC (ya I said it) with the Tide boasting one very nice out of conference win (Va. Tech).  They’re still perfect, although I’d argue that they’re two of the more mediocre elite teams in some time.  Florida has Tebow, Alabama has tradition, and for me, that’s where the excitement with those teams ends.  On the other end of this joyless ride is Texas, a team screwed over by the BCS title game last year (after they played a very tough schedule and beat some very good teams).  This year’s Texas team is nowhere near as impressive and boasts a resume laughable compared to last year’s superior team.

But at number three in the polls, and with two heavyweights at one and two set to duke it out in Atlanta, the Longhorns are in the perfect spot.  Win out and no one will screw them over this year.  The question is, with just one win, ONE! over a ranked team (Oklahoma isn’t ranked) are they even worthy?

While you ponder that, consider this: It’s one thing to have two titans land on a crash course to play each other in the championship game.  It’s another to have three rather underwhelming teams with great defenses monopolizing the damn polls for a good 95% of the season.

This has been just an abysmal year for huge mega games on a week to week basis.  Remember last year with the Big12?  I mean wow, that was great.  Texas, Texas Tech, and Oklahoma all jockeying for positioning.  No one in the Big 6 of the BCS conference world went undefeated last year.  This year we could be looking at three.  But it’s been about as enjoyable as watching paint dry.

Cincinnati is in the mix, but playing in the lesser-thought-of Big East hasn’t helped their cause.  The ACC could argue that Georgia Tech is a nice team that deserves some more pub, but, who are we kidding, can anyone from that conference truly be taken seriously as a championship team?

TCU and Boise State are both undefeated and both knocking on the BCS door. The Horned Frogs are fourth and could vault into the championship game if hell freezes over.  The Broncos beat Oregon.  And uh, yeah, did we mention it was the first week of the season?

No one boasts a resume that just blows your mind.  Who has Florida played?  O right, LSU.  And they get Alabama in the title game, but that’s not part of their REGULAR season schedule.  How about Alabama?  We love to pat them on the back for their game against the Hokies, but the rest of their non conference schedule: North Texas, FIU, and Chatanooga reads like one big joke.  UF and Bama have one thing to hang their hats on: they both beat LSU… who barely just beat Lousiana Tech.

As for Texas, well they did beat UCF, which just beat Houston!  Yeah, send ‘em to Pasadena.

It would never happen, but what if a team like Cincinnati, which has arguably played better teams this year, leap-frogged the Horns?  I’m not saying they’re better, but they sure as heck seem to play much better competition.  Their non-conference slate:  Oregon State and Illinois (okay so the Illini suck, but that’s not the point).

The point is this: college football needs CHAOS!  What happened to two loss teams still being in the mix?  Parity is needed.  Dictatorship is what it feels like.  Florida needs to lose to FSU, Alabama needs to get taken out in the Iron Bowl by Auburn.  Texas needs to be uphended by Texas A&M (Hey it could happen, no?)  All of a sudden the BCS title game picture would be crystal clear with fuzziness.  UF and Alabama would be anything but locks for the title, even with a win over each other.  The Horns would probably be dropped entirely from the discussion, because HELLO!  they haven’t beaten anyone.  All of a sudden the Cincy’s, TCU’s, Boise’s, and even Georgia Tech’s of the world would have a chance.

And that’s what this season needs.  A chance.  A chance to stir the pot.  This season has gone way too long going according to plan.  We need some glitches to send the final few weeks spiraling out of control.

So here’s a plea to the underdogs taking on the self appointed big dogs: knock em down a peg would ya?  And make this season a whole lot more interesting.