by By Lya Wodraska Tribune Columnist , The Salt Lake Tribune

Funny how the college football season worked out. Talk before the first kickoff was how great it would be if the Cougars and Utes were undefeated for their November showdown.

But in hindsight, that could have been the worst thing for the Utes.

It almost happened, and it almost launched the Broncos into the BCS .

Here is how it went.

Before the BYU-TCU game, which was held the week before the BCS standings started, BYU was ranked No. 8 in the USA Today Coaches Poll, Utah was No. 13, Boise State was No. 16 and TCU was No. 24.

The Horned Frogs soundly beat the Cougars and that, at least for the Utes, is when the magic happened.

In the first BCS standings released three days later the Utes were No. 11, Boise State was No. 12, TCU was No. 14 and BYU was No. 21.

TCU's win served the Utes in several ways. It took out the front-runner in the BCS race, but most importantly set the stage for Utah's showdown with the Horned Frogs on Nov. 6.

Going into that game, Utah was No. 8 in the BCS standings, Boise State was lurking at No. 10, right behind Oklahoma State and TCU was No. 12.

Simply put, the Horned Frogs HAD to be ranked for the Utes to stay ahead of the Broncos. That game gave the Utes all kinds of national exposure, which is important for voters, and gave the Utes a little bump in the computer polls.

Utah would have gotten that same kind of bump in the computers if BYU had beaten TCU and the Utes had taken care of the Cougars, but by that time I'm almost certain the Broncos, who were the darlings of ESPN this season, would have passed the Utes and would have had all the momentum from voters.

As it worked out, the Utes moved up to No. 7 in the BCS standings after holding on to beat TCU 13-10 and Boise State was No. 9, just behind Penn State, which replaced Oklahoma State after the Cowboys lost to Texas Tech.

If TCU hadn't beaten the Cougars and done so as convincingly as it did to jump them high into the standings, Utah could be crying foul right now rather than yelling BCS !

---

* LYA

WODRASKA can be reached at lwodraska@

sltrib.com. To write a letter about this or any sports topic, send an e-mail to sports

editor@

sltrib

.com.

Copyright 2008 The Salt Lake Tribune All Rights Reserved
	Terms & Conditions     Privacy Copyright © 2009 LexisNexis, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.