BCS tiebreaker spells trouble for Texas Longhorns

The hoopla already has commenced, you might have noticed.

The undefeated Texas Tech Red Raiders are suddenly more popular than ... well ... Zorro.

Coach Mike Leach is making the talk show rounds, and they’re casting longing glances at him from Tennessee.

Tech’s opponent for the Nov. 22 Big Game, college football blueblood Oklahoma, is already holding its own news conferences. In the meantime, its fans are making plans for the Big 12 title game.

But, excuse me, neighbors? Fellow Big 12 followers? Poll voters?

Aren’t you all forgetting something?

Something called Texas?

The Texas Longhorns have a 9-1 record, a No. 4 ranking in The Associated Press football poll and, it seems, little or no sentimental appeal outside of the Austin city limits.

According to the ongoing polls, the Oklahoma Sooners are No. 5 and climbing. Texas, on the other hand, is yesterday’s news.

It’s not fair, of course. The football gods giveth (see Rose Bowl, 2004 season); the football gods taketh away.

If the home team prevails in Norman, Okla., in eight days and the Sooners hand Tech its first defeat, a potential three-way tie for the Big 12 South’s top spot could transpire. And as all OU fans already know and are giggling about, the tiebreaker to advance to the conference championship game is highest ranking in the BCS standings.

And as noted BCS-ologist Jerry Palm said Thursday, "I’m leaning toward Oklahoma winning the tiebreaker."

Palm’s Web site, full of wise observations on the BCS madness, can be found at www.collegeBCS.com.

Do the math, it seems. While Texas ties a big orange bow on its memorable regular season with pedestrian scrimmages against Kansas and Texas A&M, both unranked, Oklahoma gets to finish with a flourish against Tech and 11th-ranked Oklahoma State.

Should Oklahoma win both — not a given, by any means — the Sooners are expected to gain enough Frequent Challenger points to leapfrog over the Longhorns in the standings and merrily dance to the Big 12 title game.

This, despite the fact that on Oct. 11, the Longhorns did truly defeat the Oklahomans 45-35 at the Cotton Bowl.

Head-to-head results? By the time the numbers are crunched and the ballots are cast, Texas’ victory will be a distant memory, sort of like Ricky Williams after a hemp party.

How can this happen? How can the voters rank a team ahead of one that it’s already lost to?

It happens all the time. In the coaches’ poll this week, Brigham Young is four spots ahead of a TCU team that beat the Cougars 32-7. Missouri is ahead of Oklahoma State. And Oregon State, despite beating Southern Cal, is 17 places in the AP poll behind the Trojans.

It’s a poll, not a king-of-the-hill competition. Voters bring all manner of personal biases, college loyalties and self-imposed "rules" into the voting booth with them.

Didn’t Mack Brown try to explain his Longhorns’ surprise Rose Bowl berth in 2004 by saying that since their regular seasons were over, the coaches finally took their votes seriously?

In a perfect college football world, the coaches wouldn’t even vote. The AP is probably always going to conduct a writers and broadcasters poll, because it can and people are interested. But when the AP begged out of the BCS calculations, it was the right thing to do.

The much-maligned Who Are Those Guys poll, the Harris Interactive one, is probably closest to the ideal method — good fans with no known public agendas.

Computers? Garbage in, garbage out.

When Longhorns fans are sitting around on Nov. 22, hoping that Rice beats Marshall, the relative uselessness of the BCS computers will be forever underscored.

The two most forgotten teams in the polls, all dressed up and with only a lousy BCS bowl to go to, seem destined to be Texas and Southern Cal. While Texas dreads the three-way Big 12 tie, too many undefeated and one-loss teams have cluttered the path between the Trojans and another trip to the BCS Championship Game.

If Texas Tech reaches the big game, Longhorns fans will rue the ending of their Nov. 1 game, but they should be able to stomach the BCS verdict.

But if a one-loss Oklahoma team reaches yet another BCS title game, loyal Orangebloods are going to shout for justice.

Be careful, though. If OU defeats Tech, Texas will likely move ahead of the Red Raiders in the BCS standings.

As Palm said, "You can’t have it both ways."

As always in the polls, when you lose is often more important than who you lose to.

Brace yourself, therefore, Texas fans. And hope the voters and computers remember what a memorable UT season this was.