There is a provision in the BCS contract that allows the BCS bowls to swap teams should a school be appearing in the same bowl on consecutive seasons or to create a more intriguing match-up in the Bowl Championship Series.
Under this clause the Orange Bowl and the Fiesta Bowl signed off on a swap that would have send Kansas to Glendale and the Sooners to Miami. The reason why that would have been advantageous to Oklahoma is because it would have put them up against #3 Virginia Tech. In essence we would have had #1 vs. #2 in the BCS championship and #3 vs. #4 in the Orange Bowl.
The swap was approved by Oklahoma, Kansas, the Orange Bowl committee, the Fiesta Bowl committee and even Fox Sports who owns the broadcasting rights to both games. The reason we didn't see this happen is because on the eve of the BCS selection announcements the swap failed to receive the majority vote from the 11 conference commissioners and Notre Dame.
In an act of utter stupidity these idiots (known as conference commissioners) robbed the Oklahoma Sooners and Virginia Tech Hokies the opportunity to play for a split national championship and college football fans the opportunity to see two match-ups featuring the nation's top 4 teams in the same week. All to protect a system that is broken.
The gutless cowards won't release who voted in which way but you can almost take it to the bank that the Big 10, Big East, Pack 10 and SEC voted against it. I honestly don't blame the Big 10 and SEC for voting against it because they are protecting their own interest and trying to keep the national championship exclusively between their two conferences. The Big East would have lost Oklahoma for Kansas which isn't a bad swap but it would have taken away the higher ranked team from their match-up in the Fiesta Bowl. The Pac 10 is noted for strongly being opposed to anything that remotely resembles a playoff and this scenario sure would have gotten the talk going.
Obviously the ACC and Big 12 would have been in favor so that leaves five conferences and Notre Dame out there, who have virtually no vested interested in this, to cast the deciding votes and the majority of them voted against it. If there was ever a season to rebel against the BCS system this was it and if there was ever an event to spark the rebellion the Orange Bowl could have been it. The fans would have loved it, the sports writers would have loved it and the networks would have loved it. However, we won't see it because 12 people appear to be mindless puppets to the formula that is systematically stripping the sport of its dignity.
"(This) is a real interesting element worthy of further exploration. I just hope at some point in time we can hear an explanation of why this wasn't possible given the fact the rules provided that opportunity if it was in everybody's best interest. Clear-thinking, well-intentioned minds would like to know whether something like this is possible." - OU Athletic Director Joe Castiglione to Steward Mandel
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