We live in a world filled with greed and lust, love and hate, drugs and passion8212;and that’s just our sports.
In America, sports are ultra-competitive, and everyone wants the biggest and best for their team.
College football is built to smile at the “big boys” and scowl at the “little guy.” Teams such as Texas or Southern California get all the love and, in turn, all the players.
Winning the majority of games is a feat that few teams even dream about, let alone do, and going undefeated throughout an entire season is nearly impossible.
That is exactly why I cannot dismiss what the 1984 Cougars or 2008 Utes were able to accomplish. They both beat the odds and did what they weren’t supposed to do, and it was impressive.
However, one team’s achievement is far more impressive than the other.
The ’84 Cougars went 13-0 and were named the National Champions at the end of the season because they were the only team that had a perfect record.
In ’08, Utah went 13-0, was the only undefeated team in the country, won a Bowl Championship Series game and finished the season No. 2 in the final rankings.
Anybody who says the ’84 team is better or achieved more than the ’08 team has no idea what they are talking about and should admit that they only watch football for the halftime shows.
The facts don’t lie.
BYU played in an age with no BCS. At the end of the season, voters looked at the final records, and if you didn’t have a loss, you were crowned the champ. In 1984, the term “strength of schedule” meant nothing, and the Cougars were allowed to play a horrible schedule and get away with it.
BYU’s combined opponents’ record was 63-84-3 (.42 winning percentage), and the best team it beat all season was an 8-4 Air Force team. The Cougars played in the Holiday Bowl that year against a 6-6 Michigan team and won 24-17 on a last-minute touchdown.
Washington finished the ’84 season 11-1 with its only loss coming to No. 10 USC 16-7. The Huskies then beat No. 2 Oklahoma in the Orange Bowl 28-17.
If the Cougars would have gone undefeated in today’s college football era, they would have finished no better than No. 5 in the BCS based on their schedule.
Congratulations to the Cougars for performing at the right time.
The ’08 Utes did everything the Cougars did and more. They played a difficult schedule, went undefeated and, because of the BCS system, could do no better than No. 2 in the final rankings.
Utah’s combined opponents record was 88-75 (.54 winning percentage), the team had an average margin of victory of 20 points, and it had a 31-17 victory over No. 4 Alabama in the Sugar Bowl.
Utah won four games against ranked opponents in ’08, including two teams that finished the season in the top 10. In contrast, BYU didn’t play a single ranked team.
With each passing year, college football gets more competitive, so nobody can take away what the small teams from Utah did.
But, when comparing the two, it’s clear which year was more impressive.
