By Bob Colayco (Cal '02) and Brian Ekberg (Auburn '95)

Each year college football has a championship game, and each year that game--indeed the entire bowl system--is mired in controversy. From the weeks leading up to the season's kickoff, when football fans are inundated with meaningless preseason polls and "expert analysis," to the final weeks of the year, when several teams try to make strong cases for inclusion in the only bowl game that counts, it seems like college football and heated hullabaloo go hand in hand. To make matters worse, the BCS system, ostensibly created to assist in choosing the final championship matchup, has, with its arcane mathematical formulas, seemingly only confused things further.

This year is no different. Not only did 2004 see five teams go undefeated on the year, but a firestorm of controversy erupted when Cal and Texas switched places in the BCS standings, giving the Longhorns a Rose Bowl bid and sticking the Golden Bears in the Holiday Bowl to face a subpar Texas Tech team. Is it any wonder college pigskin fans across the country are bent on removing the "C" from the BCS acronym?

Here at GameSpot Sports, we want to fix a championship system that is for all intents and purposes "broken." While there are numerous solutions (eliminating preseason polls is a good start), the most obvious is a playoff system. After all, it works in college basketball and baseball. Heck, it even works in NCAA Division I-AA football. So why couldn't it work in the Big Show?

To that end, we've created our own playoff system and have decided to simulate the results of the tournament using EA Sports' NCAA Football 2005. The system is straightforward and employs the final BCS standings to determine seeding. Therefore, the number one team faces the number eight team; the number two team faces the number seven team; and so on. For our game settings, we used All-American difficulty level, and in the interest of reaching a happy medium between realism and preserving our sanity, we simulated the games on seven-minute quarters. Finally, we used the default rosters found in the game and made no adjustments.

So here it is: our best guess as to how a playoff tournament might look in 2004. As you'll undoubtedly see, the results may surprise you. And here we were trying to avoid further controversy...

Quarterfinals

#8 Virginia Tech Hokies at #1 USC Trojans

The USC Trojans arrived at the LA Memorial Coliseum with all the swagger and confidence you might expect from the number one college football team in the nation. They left that same stadium, however, a humbled team. In a defensive struggle sure to please only immediate family members of Dick Butkus, the underdog Virginia Tech Hokies eked out a 6-3 win over the 2003 cochampions to move on to the tournament semifinals.

The Virginia Tech team came out of the gate early, driving the ball with confidence in its first possession by successfully converting four consecutive third-down situations. The fifth time was a charm for USC, however, as the Trojans' tightfisted defense finally held the Hokies' offense to a mere field goal. The game would not see another score until midway through the third quarter when, sparked by a great punt return by USC's Reggie Bush, the Trojans finally began moving the ball with some regularity. A first-down pass from Matt Leinart to Whitney Lewis gave USC the ball at the 8-yard line, where the Hokies managed to hold USC to a field goal, which tied the game at 3-3.

USC Heisman hopeful Matt Leinart struggled all day against the miserly Hokies defense.

In the fourth quarter, senior linebacker Mikal Baaqee picked off a Matt Leinart pass to set in motion the final victorious drive for the Hokies. Tech quarterback Bryan Randall led another brilliant drive by successfully converting several third downs with passes to Justin Hamilton, which more than kept VT's playoff hopes alive. Kicker Ryan Killeen nailed his second field goal on the day to give Tech a 6-3 lead, while the Hokies' defense did the rest by sacking Leinart and forcing two incomplete passes to ice the game once and for all.

USC quarterback Leinart's Heisman aspirations took a serious hit in this game, as he only completed seven passes on 28 attempts and threw for two interceptions, which is nearly half the number of picks he threw during the entirety of the 2004 regular season.

Final Score: Virginia Tech - 6, USC - 3

#6 Utah Utes at #3 Auburn Tigers

There was some palpable concern as the high-flying Utes arrived at Jordan-Hare stadium about how Utah coach Urban Meyer's departure would affect his team's play. By the end of the game, which resulted in a 10-3 Auburn victory, any possible concerns were clearly addressed. The nation's third-highest-scoring offense was effectively shut down, posting a final score that was 43 points below its season average, after being throttled by a stingy Tigers defense. Quarterback Alex Smith, a Heisman candidate, had his worst game of the year for Utah, completing only 11 of 40 passes for 188 yards, no touchdowns, and one interception.

Auburn didn't exactly play inspired football either, however. Aside from a workmanlike 27-carry, 96-yard rushing performance from Carnell "Cadillac" Williams, Auburn's offense sputtered and wasted numerous opportunities to put the game away. Kicker John Vaughn missed three out of four field goal attempts, including a 44-yard try in the first quarter that hit the crossbar and bounced back onto the field. Tiger quarterback Jason Campbell also squandered a promising drive and a first-and-goal opportunity in the third quarter by getting picked off by Utah defensive back Eric Weddle on the 5-yard line.

The Tigers escaped from a first-round matchup with a 10-3 win.

Utah actually drew first blood in the game by scoring on its initial drive of the second quarter. The drive started on the Auburn 45 thanks to a short punt out of the end zone by the Tigers. Key plays on the drive included a third-down reception by wideout Cody Sorenson and a draw play to the 15-yard line by Ute QB Alex Smith. The Utes' inability to rush the ball, however, stalled the offensive drive, so they settled on a 27-yard field goal.

Later in the quarter, Auburn answered Utah's score with its own 28-yard field goal, which was set up by a 49-yard bomb from Campbell to wide receiver Ben Obomanu on the Utah 7-yard line. The Tigers could not find the end zone, however, as Williams was stopped on two consecutive runs, and Campbell's third-and-goal pass fell harmlessly out of bounds. The game's only touchdown was scored at the end of the first half on a 42-yard Hail Mary from Campbell to Anthony Mix...just as time expired. The desperation pass was set up by four straight runs by Williams for a total of 30 yards.

Utah would get two chances at the end of the game to tie the score. The Utes second-to-last drive ended on a Will Herring interception at the Tiger 10-yard line with little more than a minute and a half to play. The Utes would see the ball again, but with no timeouts remaining, the clock ran out on Utah after an Alex Smith bomb to John Peel advanced the ball to the Auburn 16.

Final Score: Auburn - 10, Utah - 3