It speaks volumes about the state of college football in 2007 when a team reaches the BCS national championship with two losses. Louisiana State University became the first team to do so with two losses. Ohio State did it with 1 loss.

Should the Tigers have been there? Georgia, Southern Cal, Missouri, West Virginia and Kansas thought they should have been selected over LSU. Each of them was wrong in the end. Any one of them should have replaced Ohio State, not LSU.

The LSU Tigers kicked out Ohio State for the second year in a row. The Buckeyes started fast and couldn’t even begin to finish what they started. It wasn’t even a decent street fight. After rallying 10 points early on, Ohio State’s No. 1-ranked defense gave up 31 straight points to lose 38-24.

Early in the second quarter, LSU blocked an Ohio State field goal attempt before driving for a touchdown, then intercepted a pass to drive for another score. Last year, Ohio State started with a 7-0 lead against Florida before suffering an even more lopsided 41-14 loss. Ohio State’s legacy in its 9 bowl games against Southeastern Conference teams is terrible, the Buckeyes have yet to win a single stinking victory.

Ohio State’s loss to LSU made them the third team to lose 2 BCS title games. Oklahoma and Florida State have also lost 2 BCS title games. It’s not like the Jim Tressel-led Buckeyes can’t win a national championship. They beat Miami 31-24 to win the title in 2002. They can’t seem to pull it off against SEC teams, who are 4-0 in BSC title games, making the SEC the ONLY undefeated conference among the top 6 conferences.

For me, the game was a big disappointment because it wasn’t competitive for a national championship. A snapshot during the game says it all to me. The TV crew shows a close-up of 3 Ohio State players talking about their misery.

I look closely at the numerous stars on their helmets and think, gosh, Louise, between them they must have over 100 stars on their helmets. These are for individual efforts to record a 100-yard rushing game, score a touchdown, intercept a pass, recover a fumble, or whatever. Who cares? Stars on helmets cannot block and knock down.

I’m thinking, “This must be the go-to brains for individual glory at Ohio State.” Here these guys are big shots with stars on their helmets getting the snot out on national TV in the title game. Good grievance. Soccer is a team sport.

Given his dismal performance, I think Jim Tressel and the Ohio State glory brigade need to rest before even the stars on their helmets are embarrassed. I really don’t give a shit how many stars Jim Laurinaitis has on his helmet. As far as I’m concerned, LSU eliminated them.

Having spent the entire college football season doing weekly recaps and numerous articles on statistics that few want to believe, I’d like to point out for the record that Ohio State amassed an 11-1 record playing no top 20 team while LSU played 8 top 20 teams in playing time and beat 7 of them, losing only to Kentucky on the road in triple overtime.

Did LSU deserve to be in the national championship? Absolutely. Are they the true national champions this year? Absolutely. Bring any other arguments into the field and resolve them there. Ohio State found out who is the best team this year. Who’s to say seriously that if they played LSU next week, they’d get beaten up like LSU did at Ohio State?

(Editor’s note: This is the eighth and final article in a series on the results of the 2007 bowling game.)

Copyright © 2008 Ed Bagley