Oklahoma State Loses; What Does It Mean For Oregon?

With Oklahoma State losing in double overtime Friday, the BCS once again is a mess. LSU is unbeaten, and might or might not stay that way. But now there are nine teams — nine! — with one loss. That’s good news for Oregon, but it’s also bad news for the Ducks.

The teams that now have one loss were ranked Nos. 2-10 in the BCS standings this week: Oklahoma State (ranked No. 2 when it was unbeaten), Alabama, Oregon, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Clemson, Virginia Tech, Stanford, Boise State. All of that points directly to an LSU-Alabama rematch in the title game. Here’s how:

— Clemson, Virginia Tech, Stanford, and Boise State were well back in the BCS computations this week. We’ll eliminate them from consideration.

— Oregon has USC, Oregon State, and then a Pac-12 title game against an unranked team that has at least four losses. Nothing there to help the Ducks’ case, even if they win them all.

— Alabama presumably will move up to No. 2 in the BCS, provided it can somehow hold off Georgia Southern on Saturday (which gives us a chance to complain again about the SEC’s wimpy scheduling). The Tide then play Auburn and probably no SEC title game (because they likely won’t win their division). In truth, Alabama has the easiest road to the BCS title game, even easier than LSU.

— LSU hosts Arkansas next Friday. That could give us 10 one-loss teams. If that happens, and we end up with a three-way tie between LSU, Alabama, and Arkansas in the SEC West, the tiebreaker would come down to the head-to-head result between the two highest-ranked teams in the BCS. Trust me. Or you can read it here.

— The winner of the SEC West probably will face Georgia in the conference title game.

— Oklahoma State plays Oklahoma in two weeks in a battle of one-loss teams (if Oklahoma beats Baylor this week). I’m guessing that Oklahoma State will be ranked behind Oklahoma following its loss. Either way, Oregon will be rooting for whichever team is ranked lower. By the way, the Big 12 doesn’t have a championship game.

So, if Oregon can win its remaining games, there appear to be three ways the Ducks can return to the national title game:

— Have Alabama lose to Auburn.

— Or have Georgia beat LSU or Alabama or Arkansas in the SEC title game.

— Or have Arkansas beat LSU by enough to drop the Tigers below the Ducks (unlikely, since LSU defeated Oregon 40-27 in the season opener) but not by enough to jump over the Ducks in the standings.

See? Told you it was a mess. But it’s a delicious, intriguing, entertaining one.