BCS Bowl Games: LSU, Alabama, NCAA Football Championship

That we have a new set of BCS bowl games is yet another year we don’t have a college football playoff system. One visit to the NCAA website is all it takes to show how bad the situation is. If all NCAA sports, “football” is not listed as having a championship on this page; there’s a link on the right that reads “postseason football,” and after you click on it, this text appears:

The NCAA compiles the finances for the bowl games as part of its licensing role for the contests but earns no revenue from the BCS or other bowl games. BCS revenue goes to participating teams and conferences through revenue distribution plans. Smaller revenue portions are provided to independents and Football Championship Subdivision conferences to enhance the overall health of college football.

And there’s no link at all to the BCS Football website (which looks like it’s operated by ESPN). In other words, the NCAA is sending the message, ‘We’ll take the money, but we really don’t want to be associated with the BCS enough to link to it.”

In other words, the reason why there’s no college football playoff system, with the NCAA serving as more than a licensing arm for “postseason football” is presented loud and clear by the NCAA itself: MONEY. And a new playoff system will certainly interrupt that gravy train, which consists of a total of 66 – yes SIXTY SIX – bowl games.

And with that, let’s take a look at the highlight games for the gravy train for 2011:

Allstate BCS National Championship Game
No. 1 LSU vs. No. 2 Alabama New Orleans – Louisiana Superdome – Jan. 9 – 8:30 p.m.

AT&T Cotton
Kansas State vs. Arkansas Arlington, Texas – Cowboys Stadium – Jan. 6 – 8 p.m.

Discover Orange
West Virginia vs. Clemson Miami Sun Life Stadium – Jan. 4 – 8:30 p.m.

Allstate Sugar
Michigan vs. Virginia Tech New Orleans – Louisiana Superdome – Jan. 3 – 8:30 p.m.

Tostitos Fiesta
Stanford vs. Oklahoma State Glendale, Ariz. – U. of Phoenix Stadium – Jan. 2

Rose Bowl Game presented by Vizio
Wisconsin vs. Oregon Pasadena, Calif. – Rose Bowl – Jan. 2 – 5 p.m.

If you’re paying attention, that you see Allstate’s name twice above is not a mistake, and it demonstrates the enormous amount of corporate dollars tied up in the current bowl game system. The trick is to maintain that level of exposure, and still have an NCAA Football Championship.

Stay tuned.