If USC is stripped of 2004 title, should Auburn get another look?
Auburn’s undefeated team of 2004 has been back in the news lately because of speculation, most of it light-hearted, that if USC has its BCS title of that year stripped for NCAA rules violations, perhaps the Tigers could get another shot at the ring almost six years after the fact. Maybe the Associated Press, wrote Kevin Scarbinsky of the Birmingham News, could take another vote to strip USC of the trophy and just give it to Auburn.
http://blog.al.com/kevin-scarbinsky/2010/05/scarbinsky_if_elected_auburn_s.html
Fun to think about but it’s not going to happen. But the mental exercise reminded me how significant that undefeated Auburn team was and how much happened after the Tigers got left out of the Big Game.
It was January, 2005, and I remember standing in the press box about an hour from kickoff for the BCS championship game between USC and Oklahoma in South Florida. Suddenly I feel a tap on my shoulder: It is Tommy Tuberville, the head coach at Auburn. His team had just beaten Virginia Tech in the Sugar Bowl 16-13 to finish 13-0.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
“Just trolling for votes,” said Tuberville. He was joking. At least I think he was.
That Auburn team (Tuberville also joked that Auburn would be named national champs by Golf Digest) remains a sore point to this day in the SEC. It changed a lot of history.
Tuberville made a conscious decision to take the high road but privately he was convinced that his Tigers, who featured running backs Cadillac Williams and Ronnie Brown, could go toe-to-toe with USC, which drubbed Oklahoma 55-19.
“We certainly would not have been intimidated,” Tuberville would tell me later. “We would have given them a pretty good shot.”
SEC Commissioner Mike Slive, the former judge, was publicly disappointed and privately pretty ticked off to the point where he, with support from ACC commissioner John Swofford, eventually went before his fellow BCS commissioners and put a proposal for a “Plus-One” model on the table. A “Plus-One” was a fancy name for what would have been a four-team playoff instead of the current two-team playoff that is the BCS.
Slive was determined that he needed to do something because, in his mind, an undefeated SEC champion should not be denied an opportunity to play for it all. Urban Meyer’s defeated Utah team of 2004 felt the same way, I’m sure.
The “Plus-One” model was discussed during those BCS meetings I attended in South Florida but no action was taken. The majority of the commissioners wanted to stick with the status quo, which is what we will have until the current contract expires after the games of January, 2014.
A lot has happened since 2004. The SEC has now won four straight BCS national championships and, in the process, has convinced a lot of the voters of the strength of its league. The streak started with Florida (2006) and LSU (2007) simply overwhelming Ohio State in two straight BCS title games. In 2008 and 2009 Florida and Alabama defeated high-scoring Big 12 champs in Oklahoma and Texas.
This four-year streak has changed everything from the SEC perspective. The league office now feels that the SEC has proven its strength to the point where it is highly unlikely—almost impossible—that an undefeated SEC champion would be left out of the BCS title game.
In short, I’m not hearing anything these days about a “Plus-One” model from my friends at the SEC.
“I think with our performance on the field the SEC has positioned itself very well,” Slive told me not long ago.
So I’ll put it two questions to you this morning:
1. Regardless of what conference you pull for, do you see an undefeated SEC champion getting left out of BCS title game again?
2. If USC is stripped of its 2004 by the BCS, what should come of it? Should it remain vacated or should Auburn, which finished No. 2 in the final AP and coaches polls, get some kind of consideration?
The floor is yours.
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417 comments Add your comment
BREAKING NEWS
May 27th, 2010
8:28 am
“I will laugh until my side hurts and then some when the coming season is done and WE (SC) are #1 again! (At the expense of some poor trailer trash SuckEC team)”
Looks like someone was in a coma the last 4 years. 4 straight SEC National Title wins.
USC won’t be ranked number one. That title will go to Alabama.
BREAKING NEWS
May 27th, 2010
8:34 am
“The reason Auburn did not get more consideration for their undefeated season was their weak schedule (non-SEC: La Tech, Citadel, La-Monroe).”
Florida played the Citadel in 2008.
LSU played La Tech in 2007.
Yep, looks like there are people who will overlook certain teams playing crappy OOC schools but will rail on Auburn.
Hypocrite much?
RT
May 27th, 2010
8:54 am
I like how the folks who point to AU’s 2004 out of conference schedule always point to the Citadel – the same Citadel that was on the Florida Gators schedule when the Gators were given the nod for the NC game (after winning the SECC) in 2008.
AU was royally screwed in 2004 and if So. Cal’s wins are vacated, a “wrong” needs to be righted and AU should step up to the plate and claim the NC.
76-Dawg
May 27th, 2010
9:07 am
Even though I will always dislike Auburn because of what Shug Jordon taught and advocated in the early 70’s in order to beat UGA, I do pull for all of the SEC schools when they are not playing UGA and hope as many SEC schools finish in the top 20 as possible. In 2004 by the end of the year Auburn was a football power house. The only team that could have beaten USC.I said if they match USC with Oklahoma only to have the number 1 and 2 quarterback of 2004 play each other that USC would win by at least 4 touch downs if not more. And that is exactly what happened. It was an easy call. The media and big bucks of TV made that happen and the BCS got caught up in the hype and went along with it.The BCS lost a lot of credibility that year and is still suffering because of it. Because of what happened that year the only true, fair way to determine a national championship is a play off but it will still be flawed if the play off system want allow 2 SEC team to possibly play for the national title.
steven chappelle
May 27th, 2010
3:48 pm
Why not give it to Auburn…USC cheated…Choke-lahoma was a joke(one of the usual suspects…Notre Dame, Ohio State, etc.)…and who would it hurt? AU certainly proved it on the field in the toughest league on the planet. So heck yeah…do the right thing…reward a great Auburn team!
ViningsDawg
May 27th, 2010
5:53 pm
Auburn should have gotten to play USC. If offered I guess they should take it, but that would be like being Alabama and claim every NC from whoever offered it from the beginning of time.
Oh, Tech backed out of the 2004 game at the Dome due to ACC scheduling problems.
Elmo
May 29th, 2010
4:27 pm
USC waxed Auburn Twice Head to Head. Reality Counts.
Pathetic
May 30th, 2010
3:47 am
I see the SEC has finally found a way to beat Southern Cal. Why don’t you try scheduling a game againt USC and beat them on the field. If you need the NCAA to vacate wins to claim a victory; it certainly says more about you than USC. The accusations againt USC, if true are for benefits recieved by his parents during the 2004-05 season. The earliest claims are after the end of the regular season before the 2004 Orange Bowl. There is not 1 accusation against the school or any boosters; only against sports agents.
Pathetic
May 30th, 2010
3:53 am
Hmmm. We should ignore Auburn’s scheduling walkovers because Florida pulls same chicken sh!t? Makes sense. Or, should that expose Florida for the frauds they are?
Tim
June 1st, 2010
1:03 pm
there is no doubt that Auburn should be awarded a title they clearly should have played for in the first place, to consider Oklahoma is absured as we all saw Oklahoma shouldn’t have been in the bcs title game to begin with.
As far as the bama people commenting about having a tractor parade in Auburn is just sour grapes on their behalf, as they wish to claim national titles that they never won, maybe we should go back & find seasons where no national titles were awarded & claim them as ours just like bama did …oh & bama PLEASE GET THE BCS TITLE OUT OF WALMART, your such a disgrace as a representative of the sec.
runninmedic
June 10th, 2010
12:30 am
Enter your comments here
runninmedic
June 10th, 2010
12:43 am
What I find is so typical of SEC followers is that no matter who plays whom, they always think they’re team/conference would’ve done this or would’ve done that better and ‘not been intimidated.’ Y’all please give us a break. There are a few good SEC teams but the rest are crap which makes those other few look that much better, not unlike any other conference. Big Ten with Ohio State for example, kicked the crap out of everyone in the conference but got killed in the big game a couple of years ago. Nobody can tell how one team is gonna do unless their team is actually in the game. Who’s to say USC wouldn’t have kicked all the teams that year and then OU would’ve kicked Auburn and VT and so on and so forth. Nobody knows one way or the other. I do know that OU was in the game and would be the next in line for the championship if it ever came to be but whoever said that the NCAA wouldn’t strip the media darlings is probably spot on. I would like to see either the 16 game playoff or the And 1 system in place. The current system relies too much on a bunch of BS and also wannabe’s that just write about football. But then again we’ll always find something controversial about whatever system is there.
If USC is stripped of 2004 title, should Auburn get another look? | Football Coaching Jobs
June 10th, 2010
2:38 am
[...] the Original article Posted in Uncategorized | Tags: another, Auburn, look?, should, stripped, [...]
Sooners#1
June 10th, 2010
5:27 pm
Pursuant to BCS rules the National Championship must be awarded to the winning team of the title game. In 2005, the title game was the Orange Bowl. If USC has to forfeit the game, then OU wins the National Championship. I just love rules, Boomer Sooner.
warjeffeagle
June 11th, 2010
11:51 am
Auburn beat like 5 ranked teams that year, including several in the top 10. Anyone saying that playing the Citadel, etc was reason to not be in the championship game is out of their minds.
Ross
June 11th, 2010
12:23 pm
If Auburn were to count titles like Alabama does then we would count one in 93 in which we were under probation and we would count the 2004 one.
Don Boulton
July 21st, 2010
6:18 am
Look idiots, its simple,no matter record or what you like, the BCS National championship is just that; the winner is national champs, and the loser gets ranked according to stupid stuff??? So USC gets stripped of 2004- 2005 BCS national championship game it makes OU the winner, = SIMPLE. maybe not by in the AP or Others but OU IS NOW THE BCS NATIONAL CHAMPS in 2004.