Scrambies Declares Utah National Champion

I don't need to wait for Thursday's BCS title game to award my NCAA Division I FBS championship trophy to the Utah Utes. (I'm thinking of actually dropping by the trophy shop and picking up something that I can have engraved and shipped to Salt Lake City.) I've been planning on writing a why-Utah's-as-deserving-as-anyone post for several weeks. Now I don't have to, because more talented writers than myself have done the work for me.

Heather Dinich:

There is plenty of indisputable video evidence to overturn the notion that the non-BCS schools aren't deserving of at least a shot at playing for the national title. It's not like Utah beat Pittsburgh (that was sooo 2005). Utah dominated a national championship-caliber opponent. An SEC team that was ranked No. 1 in the country during all of November. . . . It's hardly as if Alabama was Utah's first victim. The Utes beat a TCU team that was ranked No. 12 at the time, No. 14-ranked BYU, Michigan and an Oregon State team that had just come off a huge win over USC.

Mike Lupica:

Of all the arguments against the BCS, and there are so many you lose count, maybe Utah is the best of all. If Utah is BCS-worthy, then the Utes are national championship-worthy if they are the only undefeated team, or the whole thing is a joke. Computer nerds don't decide the champion anywhere else, polls don't decide the champion, strength-of-schedule doesn't decide. The games do.

John Feinstein:

There are many reasons for all of you to cast your votes for the Utes on Thursday night after the final game is finally over. . . . It isn't just because they are the only one of the 119 so-called BCS teams that finished undefeated. It isn't even because they went to New Orleans last Friday and handily beat an Alabama team that spent the last month of the regular season ranked No. 1 in every poll. It isn't just that they beat Alabama with considerably more ease than Florida did in December . . . . The reason to vote for Utah is simple: This is the one and only way you can stand up to the BCS bullies -- the university presidents, commissioners, athletic directors and the TV networks who enable them -- and, to renew a catch phrase, just say no.

Update:

Rick Reilly:

Utah is the national champion. The End. Roll credits. Argue with this, please. I beg you. Find me anybody else that went undefeated. Thirteen-and-zero. Beat four ranked teams. Went to the Deep South and seal-clubbed Alabama in the Sugar Bowl. The same Alabama that was ranked No. 1 for five weeks. The same Alabama that went undefeated in the regular season. The same Alabama that Florida beat in order to get INTO the BCS Championship game in the first place.

Dan Whetzel:

Why didn’t Utah merit consideration to play for the BCS national title? Why are the Utes, despite their 13-0 record, victories over four Associated Press top-25 teams and the champions of a conference that went 6-1 in the regular season against the Pac-10, watching one-loss teams Oklahoma and Florida play on Thursday?