BCS to revamp its bid process beginning in '07

PHOENIX — The Bowl Championship Series is opening up its automatic bids to all Division I-A conferences, starting with the 2007 season, and under a new plan the leagues will now be judged from top to bottom.

Currently, only the six conferences that formed the BCS could earn an automatic bid to college football's four major bowl games, including the national title game.

The previous standard for holding on to automatic qualification was based on the average BCS standings finish over a four-year period of a conferences' top team in the rankings. That will still be a factor, but not the only one.

"In addition, we will look at a conference's overall strength," BCS coordinator Kevin Weiberg said Wednesday, the final day of meetings with officials from 11 major college football conferences and Notre Dame's athletic director.

The BCS will also take into account the number of teams in a conference that finish in the BCS top 25 over a four-year period.

In addition, there is a proposed appeals process if a conference doesn't match up with the others under the new formula but still believes it belongs in the BCS.

"We're set through the first two years (2005-06) of the new agreement, with the same six conferences having the automatic-qualification berths," said Weiberg, the Big 12 commissioner. "This evaluation will then occur, and it could change for the final two years of this new agreement."

The BCS signed a four-year deal with Fox to televise the Sugar, Fiesta and Orange bowls from 2007-10 and the national title game from 2007-09. The Rose Bowl has its own television deal with ABC.

Weiberg said the new evaluation system could lead to more — or less — automatic bids.

The Big 12, Big Ten, Pac-10, Southeastern, Atlantic Coast and Big East champions have had automatic entry into the Rose, Orange, Sugar and Fiesta bowls since the BCS was implemented in 1998.

Other standards were set to allow teams from outside the BCS conferences to qualify automatically, but not until last year when Utah earned a spot in the Fiesta Bowl had a team from outside one of the big six conferences played in the BCS.

The BCS also decided to expand to five games last year. Starting with the 2006 season, 10 teams will qualify for the BCS, with the top two meeting in a newly created championship game to be played a week after the four major bowls.