Bowl Championship Series facts for kids

Kids Encyclopedia Facts

Quick facts for kids Bowl Championship Series
BCS logo (2010–2013)
In operation	1998–2013
Preceded by	Bowl Alliance (1995–1997) Bowl Coalition (1992–1994)
Succeeded by	New Year's Six/College Football Playoff (2014–present)
Number of BCS games	5 per season (4 from 1998 to 2006)
Championship trophy	AFCA National Championship Trophy
Television partner(s)	ABC (1999–2006) FOX (2006–2009) ESPN (2009–2014)
Most BCS appearances	Ohio State (10)
Most BCS wins	Ohio State, USC (6)
Most BCS championships	Alabama (3)
Conference with most appearances	Big Ten (28)
Conference with most game wins	SEC (17)
Conference with most championships	SEC (9)
Last championship game	2014 BCS National Championship Game
Executive director	Bill Hancock

The Bowl Championship Series (BCS) was a special system used in American college football from 1998 to 2013. Its main goal was to pick the two best teams in the country to play in a championship game. This game would decide the national champion.

The BCS also chose teams for four other big bowl games: the Rose Bowl Game, Fiesta Bowl, Sugar Bowl, and Orange Bowl. These games featured some of the top college teams. The system used a mix of polls (where people voted) and computer rankings to decide which teams were the best. This helped make sure the top two teams played each other for the championship. Before the BCS, it was common for two different teams to be called national champions by different polls. The BCS tried to stop this from happening.

In 2014, the BCS was replaced by the College Football Playoff, which uses a different system to pick a national champion.

Why the BCS Was Created and Ended
How the College Football Playoff Took Over
BCS Bowl Games
- Television Coverage
- How Teams Were Chosen
How Teams Were Ranked
BCS Buster Teams
Images for kids
See also

Why the BCS Was Created and Ended

College football is the only major sport in the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) that doesn't have a big tournament to decide its champion. Instead, teams play in individual "bowl games" after the regular season.

The first bowl game was the Rose Bowl in 1902. Over time, other famous bowls like the Cotton, Orange, and Sugar Bowls started. Conferences (groups of teams) began sending their champions to specific bowls. This meant that sometimes the two best teams in the country wouldn't play each other. This often led to "split championships," where different polls named different teams as the national champion. For example, in 1991, two teams, Miami and Washington, both finished undefeated. But they couldn't play each other because of their bowl agreements. So, they ended up sharing the national championship.

To fix this, systems like the Bowl Coalition (1992–1994) and Bowl Alliance (1995–1997) were created. But these systems still didn't include all the top conferences, especially the Big Ten and Pac-10, which were tied to the Rose Bowl.

Finally, the BCS was formed in 1998. It included the Big Ten and Pac-10, allowing the top two teams to play for the national title. This helped make sure there was usually one clear champion.

However, the BCS also faced criticism. Many felt it was unfair to teams from smaller conferences, often called "mid-major" teams. Even if these teams had perfect seasons, it was very hard for them to get into the championship game. This led to many fans wanting a playoff system. After the 2011 season, when two teams from the same conference played for the championship, the major conferences decided to create the College Football Playoff.

How the College Football Playoff Took Over

The College Football Playoff (CFP) started in 2014. It replaced the BCS as the way to find the FBS college football champion. The CFP has a four-team playoff. Two semifinal games are played, and the winners go on to the College Football Championship Game. This championship game moves to a different city each year.

Unlike the BCS, the CFP doesn't use polls or computer rankings to pick teams. Instead, a special committee of 13 people chooses and ranks the teams.

BCS Bowl Games

The BCS system featured four main bowl games, plus the National Championship Game. These were:

The Rose Bowl Game in Pasadena, California.
The Sugar Bowl in New Orleans, Louisiana.
The Fiesta Bowl in Glendale, Arizona.
The Orange Bowl in Miami Gardens, Florida.

For the first eight years, the championship game rotated among these four bowls. But starting in 2007, the BCS National Championship Game became a separate event. It was played about a week after New Year's Day at the same location as one of the host bowls.

The Ohio State University and University of Oklahoma are the only schools that played in all five BCS Bowls. Ohio State won 5 of their 10 appearances, while Oklahoma won 4 of their 9 appearances. The SEC won the most BCS championships (9), and the Big Ten had the most teams play in BCS games (28).

Television Coverage

Over the years, different TV networks broadcast the BCS games.

From 1999 to 2006, ABC showed all the original BCS games.
From 2006 to 2009, FOX took over most of the games, except for the Rose Bowl, which stayed with ABC.
From 2009 until the BCS ended in 2014, ESPN had the exclusive rights to all BCS games. ESPN still broadcasts the games that are now part of the College Football Playoff.

How Teams Were Chosen

The BCS had specific rules for picking which teams played in the bowl games:

The top two teams in the final BCS rankings automatically played in the National Championship Game.
Champions from the six "Automatic Qualifying" (AQ) conferences were guaranteed a spot in a BCS bowl. These conferences were the ACC, Big East (now American Athletic), Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12, and SEC.
The independent team Notre Dame got an automatic spot if they finished in the top eight of the rankings.
Sometimes, a highly ranked team that didn't win its conference championship could also get an automatic spot.
From 2006 onwards, the highest-ranked champion from a "non-AQ" conference could get a spot if they were ranked high enough (top 12, or top 16 and higher than an AQ champion).

After these automatic spots were filled, the remaining spots were "at-large" berths. These were given to other top teams (usually ranked in the top 14 with at least nine wins). Individual bowl committees chose these at-large teams.

Most AQ conferences had specific bowl games their champions would play in:

Rose Bowl: Big Ten champion and Pac-12 champion.
Fiesta Bowl: Big 12 champion.
Orange Bowl: ACC champion.
Sugar Bowl: SEC champion.

If a team tied to the Rose Bowl (Big Ten or Pac-12 champion) played in the National Championship Game, the Rose Bowl might have to pick a highly ranked team from a non-AQ conference.

How Teams Were Ranked

The BCS used a special formula to rank the top teams. This formula combined:

Polls: Votes from coaches (in the USA Today Coaches Poll) and sports writers (in the AP Poll, later replaced by the Harris Interactive Poll).
Computer Rankings: Scores from several different computer systems that ranked teams based on their performance.

All these scores were added together and averaged to create a team's final BCS ranking. The team with the highest average score was ranked first. This system was designed to make sure the best teams were chosen for the championship game.

BCS Buster Teams

The term "BCS Buster" was given to teams from smaller, "non-AQ" conferences that managed to earn a spot in a BCS bowl game. It was very difficult for these teams to get in because the BCS rules favored the bigger AQ conferences.

Only five schools ever became BCS Busters:

The Utah Utes
Boise State Broncos
Texas Christian University (TCU)
Hawaii Warriors
Northern Illinois Huskies

Utah, Boise State, and TCU each became BCS Busters twice. These teams often proved they could compete with the bigger schools. For example, Boise State famously won the 2007 Fiesta Bowl in overtime against Oklahoma. TCU also defeated Wisconsin in the 2011 Rose Bowl.

The success of these "BCS Buster" teams showed that there was a lot of talent outside the major conferences. This helped push for a more open system, which eventually led to the College Football Playoff.

Images for kids

BCS Championship game at the Rose Bowl, Pasadena, California, January 7, 2010, Alabama vs. Texas
A map of every university in the AQ Conferences in 2013.
Utah Utes fans rush the field after defeating rival BYU in November 2004, completing a perfect regular season, and becoming the first BCS Buster by clinching a spot in the 2005 Fiesta Bowl.
Original BCS Logo 1998–2005.
BCS Logo 2006–2009.