2012-2013 College Football Preview
By Jeff Lafferty College football fans have been making arguments for a play-off system to decide a national championship for years, and soon enough, we will have at least the college football champion decided on the field of play and not with computer matchups. That means no more undefeated teams without getting a chance to make their case on the field (at least we hope). Hopefully soon we won’t have preseason polls to help favor one team over another, thereby allowing a third -ranked team that loses no games to still wind up playing a bridesmaid. While not the most important challenge facing the nation, (have you seen the price of gas or your 401(k) statements lately?), the issue of 10 | Summer 2012
arguing about a playoff for now has been put aside because the major college presidents have finally agreed upon a four-team playoff starting in the year 2014. The number 1 through 4 teams in the BCS (Bowl Championship Series) play each other in a semi -finals on Jan. 1st in one of the major college football bowl games (Orange, Rose, Sugar, and Fiesta Bowls). Then a week later the winners play in a site to be determined for a national title game. This is a start so that now the argument can be which team got left out to play in the final four. I don’t know any serious college football fan who hasn’t thought that at least this is a good start to finally decide a national title in major college football. I mean this being a presidential election year and earlier in his tenure President Obama is quoted as saying “I’m going to throw my weight around a little bit. If there’s not a clear decisive win-
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ner we should be creating a play-off system.” Thank you Mr. President! If the recessions, the war in Afghanistan and North Korea’s problems are difficult enough to solve, at the very least college football can try to take care of something that has an obvious and easy solution. In the meantime, I have nothing against preseason polls, and with this being my first time doing a college football season prediction column, I can only hope that I can be as informative, entertaining, and accurate in my predictions for the upcoming college football season as any other publication that gives you this information. This year, three teams seem to stand out that will have a run for a national title: USC (University of Southern California), LSU, and Ala(Continued on page 11)