...is starting to get attention as the USC decision looms...
Here's a story from Yahoo! today:
http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/blog/dr_saturday/post/BCS-Bush-plan-could-put-USC-s-2004-title-at-ri?urn=ncaaf,242417BCS 'Bush plan' could put USC's 2004 title at risk
By Matt Hinton
Any day now, the NCAA's verdict in its four-year investigation into Reggie Bush's allegedly lucrative career at USC shall be released, presumably to great fanfare regardless of the specific consequences — or, just as interestingly, the lack thereof. (We're to the point that I'm getting vague email tips about the exact time the announcement is supposed to come, only to watch the proposed deadline quietly pass.) But the next phase of this ongoing story will have legs of its own if sanctions are indeed handed down. It will begin with the inevitable appeals process and extend through one of the central pillars of the speculation from the very beginning: If Bush is declared retroactively ineligible during his All-American sophomore and junior seasons, what happens to USC's 2004 BCS championship?
The answer until now has been "We don't know," because the NCAA has no authority over BCS bowls or titles, no precedent exists for a retroactively ineligible player on a recent championship team and the BCS has kept its nose out of what it sees, so far, as other people's business. Behind the scenes, it seems the BCS has been less silent, according to USA Today, which reported Wednesday night that the series has had a largely overlooked plan in place for ineligible players for years:
Quietly in early 2007, as the investigation into USC and alleged improprieties involving Bush and his family was unfolding, college football's Bowl Championship Series drew up a policy calling for teams' BCS appearances and BCS titles to be vacated when major rules violations subsequently are discovered and the institutions are sanctioned by the NCAA. Current BCS executive director Bill Hancock confirmed the provision Wednesday.
[...]
[The BCS'] policy stipulates: "When the NCAA or a conference makes a finding of violations … and imposes a sanction of forfeiture or vacation of contests in which an ineligible student-athlete participated, we will presume that vacation of participation in a BCS bowl game is warranted." That's if the player in question participated in that BCS game or in victories that led to the bowl berth.
The final decision would come down to the university heads on the BCS' Presidential Oversight Committee, but only after "the very end of the NCAA process," according to Hancock, "including any appeals."
The provision hasn't applied to any of the teams that have had wins vacated by the NCAA over the last five years (namely Oklahoma, Florida State and Alabama) because none made it into a BCS game in the years in which the sanctions applied. In fact, for all the asterisks in the history of the "national championship," none has ever been appended because of an ineligible player or any other malfeasance uncovered after the fact. (Not that a few of of those teams, perhaps a lot of them, didn't or don't still deserve the scutiny. But they haven't been officially sanctioned by the NCAA or any of the many bodies that have dished out trophies through the years.) But it would seem to clearly apply in USC's case if Bush is declared ineligible for 2004, when he and his family are accused of beginning a relationship with would-be agents, including alleged perks and debt payments on behalf of Bush's parents, months before the Trojans routed Oklahoma to wrap up the title in the '05 Orange Bowl.
What form a vacated championship would take is anyone's guess. At minimum, USC would have to take a couple pages out of its media guide and take down a banner or two while somebody updates a couple Wikipedia pages. At the other extreme, a team of white-gloved men would stomp into Heritage Hall and carry the trophy with the crystal football away as cameras pop all around them. Even worse, the university could be asked to pay back the $3 million it earned in bowl payouts in 2004 and 2005. Maybe No. 2 Auburn, snubbed by the system despite a perfect record in the SEC, would finally get some wider recognition as "the real champion," whatever that means in lieu of a playoff. But it certainly will not change any of the facts on the field, or settle any of the old arguments about them. Future bowl bans and scholarship reductions are one thing, but as a wise man once said, we all know who won the games.
According to some posters on Scout, Auburn has been agreed on by the College Football Live crew today as the team that should be given the championship.
This is an interesting debate that seems to divide Auburn folks, ironically because we absolutely don't want to be seen as the same as those that claim lesser championships for the sake of blowing up what would have been an impressive number at the accurate count.
What does everyone think now, IFFFFF we seem to be given a respected, and perceived as earned title in lieu of the current circumstances with USC??
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