Top-10 ranking reaction

As it turned out, it was a good week for a bye week for BYU. Without playing, the Cougars soared from No. 11 to No. 8 in the AP poll and No. 7 in the coaches’ poll.

More than ever, it’s clear that BYU is in control of its own destiny. As long as the Cougars keep winning, they will play in a BCS bowl game somewhere. There’s even speculation about BYU getting into the BCS championship game. That seems improbable, but who knows? There’s still a lot of season left to play and those games at TCU and Utah will be big challenges.

This morning at his weekly press conference, coach Bronco Mendenhall said the lofty ranking is ‘flattering,’ but he isn’t putting much stock in it. ‘Maybe after four more weeks or five more weeks, there will actually be a clearer resemblance of who are the best teams in the country,’ he said.
Mendenhall added that the his team making such a big jump when it didn’t even play ‘says a lot about the system. It is interesting to me that we can move up without playing a game. I think fundamentally, that’s not right.’

Right or not, that’s where college football is. Over the years (1984, 1996 and 2001 come to mind), the “system” has robbed some very good BYU teams of the opportunity to play in big-time bowl games. It’s late September and BYU is ranked in the top 10. It’s fair to say that if the Cougars don’t get to the BCS in 2008, they can only blame themselves.