It has become very apparent that the AP voters are not doing their homework and are giving up on Saturday football way too early. If they did actually watch this weekend’s TCU game in Colorado Springs, they would have seen a Frog team fighting to win in very difficult weather conditions in which most of the players have never played. The Frogs also took down a very good Falcon team that was second in the nation in rush offense. But the AP voters didn’t see any of that. They just saw a three-point near loss for the Frogs and therefore bumped them down two spots, out of the top 10 to No. 12.
The real travesty lies back inside the top ten. An inactive Boise State team jumped back into the top 5 without playing anyone. The AP really set a precedent this week giving the benefit of the doubt to a non-automatic qualifier who didn’t even defend their honor last week and moving them back into the No. 5 position. The Broncos did nothing to merit this, and frankly, haven’t done much this season to merit this rank other than a win over Oregon, which is looking more and more like a fluke loss for Oregon with every game Oregon wins. It seems like the AP voters are content just giving the non-AQ BCS bowl spot to Boise based almost completely on past performances and national notoriety as the original BCS buster. The nation seems comfortable with Boise so the AP voters will be too.
Lucky for the Frogs, the AP poll doesn’t factor into BCS rankings and the Frogs are No. 8 in the USA Today Coaches’ Poll, which does tally into BCS rankings. All the Frogs can do now is just keep winning, and winning by more than the one point that head coach Gary Patterson stresses each week.
Boise’s last real challenge of the regular season comes Wednesday night against Tulsa. If the Broncos go down, all the Frogs’ prayers will be answered and an undefeated season would put them on the fast track to national fame. But if Tulsa doesn’t pull the upset, I don’t think the Frogs will be able to do anything on their own to reach the next plateau and will have to settle for another Poinsettia Bowl victory against a less than average Pac-10 team.
Sports editor Travis L. Brown is a news-editorial journalism major from Dallas.
