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Perhaps this belongs in the category of "The sun rises in the East and sets in the West," but it is reassuring nonetheless: Appalachian State University's Mountaineers are in the national football championship playoffs - again.
We know, we know: This may not be exactly new news, but it is big news and not just in Boone, home to App's 16,600 or so students and nearly 800 faculty members. In a state where major universities have often had more success among men's and women's teams in basketball and soccer but not on the gridiron, the Mountaineers have become among the bluebloods of college football.
They became the first NCAA Football Championship Subdivision school to win three national championships in a row (2005, 2006 and 2007) and the first FCS school to beat a ranked team in the Football Bowl Subdivision when they knocked off the fifth-ranked University of Michigan in 2007. They were gunning for their fourth championship in a row last year when they lost in the quarterfinals.
Now the Apps (9-2) are in the race for the 2009 championship. They face South Carolina State University (10-1) Saturday at noon in Kidd Brewer stadium in Boone. The Orangeburg, S.C., school's Bulldogs are in the tournament for the fourth time and the second straight appearance. Another N.C. team, Elon University's Phoenix, faces Richmond's defending champions at 1 p.m.
The 16-team Football Championship Subdivision playoff is an exciting tournament that makes the NCAA's Football Bowl Subdivision "championship" about as exciting as artificial insemination, as broadcaster Bill Currie once said in another athletic context. The bowl series schools use football polls and computer rankings to help identify matchups that will determine its national winner. Complicated, yes; convincing, no.
We hope one day the NCAA's largest schools will turn to a single-elimination tournament format that produces real champions. If they want to see how it's done, they might drop by Boone around noon Saturday to watch big-time college football - fought on the field, and not with the help of computers, polls, spin doctors or the chamber of commerce.
