Bigger accomplishment?

I know we're on a BYU site and we're all huge BYU fans, but Boise St and TCU are getting a lot of love in the national media this year. There is even some talk of national championship game for one of them.



So which would be a bigger accomplishment?

I think it's a wash. Both took/would take multiple years of dominating seasons to build up the reputation necessary to even be considered. The fact that one is in the BCS would be more impressive in previous years, but everyone (likely including the BCS, for PR reasons) have been warming up to the idea of a non-AQ team competing in the national championship for a few years now.

I'm going with BYU, because in the end, winning the national championship has to be a bigger accomplishment than just playing for it.

Isn't college football in a sad state of affairs when a certain team making it to the national championship game is a BIG and Incredible accomplishment? Like it's a miracle or something that great teams are allowed to play for the championship in their sport.

CannonCougar85 wrote:
Isn't college football in a sad state of affairs when a certain team making it to the national championship game is a BIG and Incredible accomplishment? Like it's a miracle or something that great teams are allowed to play for the championship in their sport.

well said



I think the comparison Kitic is getting at is IF BSU wins the NC, which would be the bigger accomplishment.



It's hard to say, but the fact that Boise would have to beat the #1 or #2 ranked team in the county in a championship game makes their road to the NC very difficult. That also would make it very hard for people to disrespect their NC like they do ours.



I wasn't around in '84 so I don't know how the bias against teams from mid major conferences compared to the bias against non-BCS teams today. Anyone who was around at that time care to comment?

BYU is the only non-BCS team to win the football title since the 50's. So that is huge. Also, when BYU did it, they did not have a formula like the BCS that would guarantee them a title shot if they hit certain criteria--it was all public opinion. If BSU runs the table, like BYU did, they will most likely get the title game, something BYU never would have gotten in 1984. The road while tough now, is actually easier because you know the way. BYU was in uncharted territory and blazed their own trail.

I'd vote for BSU (or BYU) in the national championship as a bigger accomplishment. In order to remove bias, the question probably should have used BYU instead of BSU.



In 1984, college football conferences much more diverse, with more than 6 established conferences. The SWC (Texas, A&M) and Big 8 (OU, NU) were still separate, the Big East was a basketball conference, and teams like Penn State, Pitt, Miami, Florida State, Virginia Tech, Boston College, Syracuse, and South Carolina were all independents. Because the power of college football was much more decentralized, conference affiliation was less important then than it is now. It was much easier for a good team to be ranked more on its merits than based on its conference affiliation-- for example, Air Force made it into the top 5 in 1985 (wins over UTEP, Wyoming, Rice, UNM, Notre Dame, Navy, CSU, Utah, SDSU, and Army) before BYU beat them. If Air Force would have beat BYU, they would have finished #2 or even #1 instead of #8.



I think a 10-0 Air Force team with that same schedule barely cracks the top 10 in today's polls, despite the fact that Utah and Navy are much, much better than they were in 1985. Today, because of the stigma attached to being a non-BCS conference and the amount of coverage dedicated to BCS conferences, a team like BSU or BYU has a lot more to overcome just to get ranked in the top 5. If BYU made it to the national championship game this year, I would consider it a much greater accomplishment than winning the 1984 national championship.