I’m wondering who this mysterious Notre Dame fan is too, considering your apparent hatred of the program. Was it Colin Sharkey of the CN? Because I can’t see Courtney turning into an ND fan simply because she is attending law school there.

I’d like a source on this.
Here’s your source for why it’s nearly certain:
There are two at-large positions in the BCS that are open to any Division I-A team. This allows any Division I-A school in the nation the opportunity to play in a BCS bowl game, should it qualify to play in the National Championship game or be selected by one of the bowls.

The BCS also notes the importance of traditional and regional considerations regarding team selection. Specifically, the four BCS Bowls will host the following conference champions in the years the national championship game is not played at their site.

These consideration tie-ins include the ACC or Big East champion in the FedEx Orange Bowl, the SEC champion in the Nokia Sugar Bowl, the Big Ten and the Pac-10 champions in the Rose Bowl and the Big 12 champion in the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl. My emphasis. The bowl hosting the at-large game (in this case the Fiesta Bowl, as likely BIG XII champion and #2 Texas will be playing in the Rose Bowl) gets to select which teams play. Since both Ohio State and Notre Dame draw far higher attendance and tv revenues than Oregon, the Fiesta Bowl’s organizers would be illogical to choose the Ducks.

What we ought to do is also schedule nonconference games against tough teams later on, when we’ve hit our stride — like USC playing Fresno State only last week.
Now that’s not a bad idea at all.

Yeah, but what would late summer be without a ridiculous trouncing of a shitty team on a perfect Saturday afternoon? I like the idea of playing shit teams as warm-ups at the start of the season. What we ought to do is also schedule nonconference games against tough teams later on, when we’ve hit our stride — like USC playing Fresno State only last week.

I’d like a source on this.

09/01 Oregon L 38-24
09/10 Sam Houston W 31-10
09/16 at UTEP L 44-41
09/24 So Miss Postponed
10/01 at Tulsa W 30-23
10/08 at Tulane W 35-14
10/15 Memphis L 35-20
10/22 at Miss St W 28-16
11/05 at C Florida L 31-29
11/13 So Miss W 27-24
11/19 SMU L 29-24

Also, from what I’ve read this morning it’s clear that the Fiesta Bowl can choose which teams come to play, in which case it’s almost certain that they’ll pick Ohio State and Notre Dame due to the fans they’ll draw both on TV and to the stadium. At this point Ducks fans only hope may be an ND loss to Stanford.

Also, a Notre Dame fan emailed you. What do they go searching the web for any and all critical comments made about them?

They have both a stifling defense and an explosive offense, a superb head coach, and (most importantly in the voters’ eyes) a glorious history and legion of fans. They are a quality team… I wouldn’t bet against them in a matchup with any team in the country.

You will notice that they are ranked as low as 17th (and average 12th) in the BCS’ computer polls but that the human voters have them as high as fifth. The humans are what is keeping the Irish in contention, not the computers.

With all of that being said, though, I’ll say again that they aren’t deserving of the at-large bid. Their victories over Michigan and Purdue seemed impressive at the time, but both programs fizzled out as the year went on. Michigan State was, as I said earlier, a pretty good team at the beginning of the season, but they were unranked and certainly not a powerhouse team. They obviously played USC very tough, but so did Fresno State and Arizona State, two teams far out of the top ten.

What hurts the Ducks is that, as usual, we had a cupcake non-conference schedule. While Fresno State obviously isn’t a bad team, Montana and Houston are garbage programs. Voters would likely rather see Oregon play good teams from major conferences and suffer an occassional close loss than see a 38-24 win over Division II-A Houston.

Anyways, this was entirely too long and I should be working on two papers, so I’m out.

The real reasons:
A reasonable playoff system could include no more than eight teams. That’s seven games total. I believe that there are currently more than 18 bowl games played every year. While the top eight schools would receive a bonanza of revenue, teams that are not within the top eight would no longer receive any postseason revenues. This is important to smaller schools in smaller conferences that are generally unable to get BCS bids. In other words, the only schools that would benefit from a playoff system regularly are the ones which consistently field top eight teams.
The main conferences want to maintain absolute control over the postseason process. A playoff system takes control out of their hands to a certain extent. Plus, as mentioned above, the bowl system keeps more schools within a conference happy.