This is a continuing look at what my design would look like for this year and will walk backwards one year per week, until the dawn of the BCS era. For other years and a better look at my design look here.

Qualifying teams

Top Group: USC ,Texas and Penn St. would have qualified as the top group of teams.
Undefeated: USC and Texas were the only undefeated teams.

Tournament

Texas would play Penn St. in the Wild Card Game and the winner would face USC in the National Championship Game.

Possible BCS Bowls

Rose: Ohio St. vs. Oregon
Fiesta: TCU vs. Notre Dame
Sugar: Georgia vs. Miami (FL)
Orange: FSU vs. West Virginia

Teams in bold would have been tied to that berth, italics indicate a BCS berth would have been guaranteed.  Auburn, Virginia Tech, LSU, and Alabama would have been BCS Eligible. Only one of Auburn, LSU or Alabama could have been eligible.

What actually happened and a tier based plus one next.

What actually happened

This year was prior to the seperation of the championship game from te four traditional BCS bowls.

BCS Games

NCG-Rose: Texas 41 USC 38
Orange: Penn St. 26 FSU 23
Fiesta: Ohio St. 34 Notre Dame 20
Sugar: West Virginia 38 Georgia 35

Controversy

The BCS enjoyed a calm year and this is the one year my design might have actually generated more controversy, as USC and Texas were lone undefeated teams, yet USC would have gotten a ride to the championship game while Texas had to get through Penn St.

The biggest source of controversy this year was Oregon being left out for Notre Dame, the next lower team.

A Tier Based Plus-One

USC would hve played Ohio St. and Texas would have played Penn St. in the semifinals.

[Editor's Note: I am in the process of updating my data to use 9 wins over FBS teams for eligibility.  This eligibility list reflects the original criteria of 10-2 or better. Once the data has been updated this post will be updated and these notes removed]

Possible first round games:

[Editor's note: This season is one of several that strongly motivated me to implement the rule change as not enough teams are available to fill the slots with the original rule]

An improvement?

This is one year the BCS got it right. The plus one at least maintains the balance of the paths for the two equally favored teams. This is the worst year for the flexible design in the 12 years of the BCS system.