The 'eye test' matters to anyone who actually 'watches' the games.
It's not supposed to. That favors flashy teams, it favors stat whores and coaches who don't watch the games but see a few highlights and go with their preconceived notions. The computers and the idea of checking the resume is supposed to safeguard from the pure idiocy of the "eye test."
And no, under uncommon circumstance, you dont need to win your conference to be the #1 team in the nation.
Clearly, and in this case it is absolutely moronic. If OkieSt had another loss, then fine. Point is, there were other teams with a legitimate case, so Alabama should have been shut out. The only reason they weren't was because of the ridiculous eye test.
I think what OK State did its entire season has relevance. Including its being beat by an unranked team.
Yea, they were beat by Iowa State and STILL had a better resume. That's the amazing thing. At the risk of repeating myself, I'll say it again.
Because of the fact that Alabama did not win it's own
division, much less it's own conference, if there was another school with a similar resume (not even to speak of a superior one) they should have received the nod.
Sure upsets happen, but what are the odds?
Now you're just trolling. Ask 2002 Miami, 2004 Oklahoma, 2005 USC, 2006 Ohio State, 2007 Oklahoma...and that's just a few major upsets from the last decade alone.
This is why resumes trump the eye test. The eye test is stupid, unreliable, completely subjective, not an actual metric approved by the BCS formula, etc etc etc.
As a conference, the SEC does currently stand apart from the rest of the nation in its performance. Are they unstoppable? No. Better as a whole? Absolutely.
The SEC is the best conference, but it was not completely dominant this year. Arkansas and Georgia are basically big 12 teams. It was not especially deep. Florida, Mississippi State, Tennessee, South Carolina all were disappointments. Quarterback play was especially weak.
IMHO it would be incorrect to consider any team other than Alabama as the national champion. This article pretty much sums it up:
http://espn.go.com/college-football...lsu-tigers-allstate-bcs-national-championship
IMHO you can pretend whatever you want from this season. I choose to pretend the Cowboys are the national champs. Just as legit as Alabama or LSU.