What happens if Pitt beats Miami? What happens if Miami beats Pitt?
What teams play in what BCS Bowls and why?

So many questions…I will do my best to answer.

Basically, the BCS Bowl selection process is complicated as all hell. The easy thing: this year, the #1 and #2 ranked teams in the BCS poll go to the Sugar Bowl.
The hard part is figuring out who else goes where.

The other Bowls (Fiesta, Orange and Rose) all have conference tie-ins that are in effect unless the champion of the tied-in conference is in the Sugar Bowl);
The Big12 champ to the Fiesta; The Big East OR ACC champ to the Orange; The Big10 AND Pac-10 champs to the Rose. These tie-ins are not written in stone, for a “host” team may be moved for the following reasons:

1) The same team hosting the same BCS Bowl for two straight years;
2) Two teams that played against one another in the most recently completed regular season;
3) The same two teams would play against each other in a bowl game for two consecutive years;
4) An alternative pairing would have greater appeal to college football fans.

Pretty vague, eh? Well, it gets better.

If a tied-in conference champ is pulled to the Sugar, then the Bowl with the #1 team picks a replacement first (from the pool of BCS eligible teams), followed by the Bowl with the #2 team.
After this, the bowls that remain unfilled will submit a list of three teams as its top three choices, with any BCS conference champ required to be among its top two choices.
In a situation where two or more bowls select the same team(s) with their choices, the priority of selection would be the following:

1) The bowl making the larger per team payment shall be given first preference;
2) The bowl not getting first priority in the previous year, would be given first preference.

At the conclusion of these procedures, the pairings established by the BCS bowls may be adjusted by the BCS, in consultation with the BCS bowls and ABC, in the interest of creating the most exciting and interesting postseason matchups possible.

The Big East
The Big East conference tie breakers are as follows:

TWO-WAY TIE
1) Team A defeats Team B and is higher ranked – Team A earns bid.
2) Team A defeats Team B and is ranked lower, but in Top 10 – Team A earns bid (except if Team B is ranked No. 1 or No. 2 in the BCS poll, then Team B earns bid.)
3) Team A defeats Team B and is ranked lower, but no less than five positions below Team B – Team A earns bid.
4) Team A defeats Team B and is ranked lower, and more than five positions below Team B – Team B earns bid.
5) If the two teams have the same ranking, or both are unranked, the bid goes to the team that has won the head-to-head contest.

How does this effect Pitt, if Pitt beats Miami? Well, in this scenario, WVU is team “A”, and Pitt is team “B”.
WVU is currently ranked below Pitt, and and since neither Pitt nor WVU are in the top-10 or top-2, then scenarios 1 and 2 do not apply. Pitt is currently ranked in the top 25, so if they win, they still will be. Thus, Pitt will get the BCS because of Scenario 4, with WVU un-ranked (or at least ranked well below Pitt, as they would be after a victory by Pitt over Miami). Scenarios 3 and 5 would not apply.

Of Miami wins against Pitt, then Scenario 2 (and 4, I guess) would put Miami in the BCS over WVU.

So – who would get to “host” the Orange Bowl? Florida State, the ACC champ, or Miami/Pitt, the Big East Champ? I imagine the higher ranked team would be the host (it doesn’t specify on the BCS site). Right now, that is FSU at #9, with Miami #10 and Pitt #25. If FSU beats #11 Florida, and Miami beats Pitt, the FSU victory will likely be more impressive, keeping FSU above Miami in the BCS. If Florida wins, then it’s possible for Miami to be the host, but not likely for Pitt if they beat Miami.

So, if Pitt wins, where do they go? If things stay as they are, OU and USC will be in the Sugar. Florida State in the Orange, Michigan in the Rose. That leaves the SEC Champ (LSU or UGa), Pitt, and two at large teams.
The Fiesta will pick a replacement for OU (assuming they beat KSU in the Big12 championship), followed by the Rose replacing USC. Pitt will almost certainly be the lowest ranked team in the BCS, given the large number of top 12 teams from the BCS conferences that have at least 9 wins.

My predictions:
Sugar: OU v. USC
Fiesta: LSU v. Pitt
Rose: Michigan v. Texas
Orange: FSU v. OSU

I am assuming that OU beats KState, and #3 LSU beats Georgia, thus the Fiesta picks LSU as their replacement.
Then, the Rose picks a replacement for USC, so it will pick Texas (won’t pick OSU because they already played Michigan, Texas is a huge school and the next highest ranked team).
It comes down to the Fiesta and the Orange. OSU was just in the Fiesta Bowl last year, plus the BCS won’t want the two worst teams (FSU and Pitt) to play each other. The Orange would be better for Pitt fans (ditto for OSU fans), but this will likely be the arrangement.

Now, if KState beats OU, OU is probably still in the title game. That means either OSU or Texas is out (probably Texas, since they are ranked lower than OSU, and two other Big12 teams would be in the BCS). If Georgia beats LSU, LSU probably wouldn’t fall as low as 5 or 6 in the polls. If both Georgia and KState win, then I can see OSU, Texas being out, and possibly LSU. What a cluster!

Now if Pitt loses, then the Gator Bowl gets to pick next. It is between Pitt and WVU, since WVU would only have 1 conference loss (assuming a victory over Temple), Pitt has two, and VaTech has three conference losses. The Big East has a “one loss rule” which mandates that a bowl must pick the best team (in-conference) or a team with only one more loss than the
best team. Pitt will likely get the nod, since we have Larry Fitzgerald and we are from a bigger market.

The Insight would HAVE to take WVU, with VaTech going to the Continental Tire, and the San Francisco Bowl (played at Pac-Bell of all places) will pick amongst BC, Syracuse (if they beat Rutgers) and Notre Dame. I include ND here because the Bowl games are supposed to weigh overall records when offering a bid, and ND can at best be 6-6, leaving them out of the running for games WVU (7-4) and VaTech (8-3) would be up for due to the one loss rule.

Now, this should all become much clearer this weekend…