Dick Harmon: TCU's move to the Big East shows the hypocrisy of the BCS

Fact: Kustra has Boise State phone records to prove schedule discussions with AQ Top 25 schools who refuse to play in Boise.

Said Gee: "I think until a university runs through that gauntlet that there's some reason to believe that they not be the best teams to (be) in the big ballgame."

The formula for BCS football teams is to sign up seven or eight home games, play one non-conference game from another BCS conference and then play as many cupcakes as possible while avoiding leaving the state boundaries, said Kustra.

Urban Meyer's Florida Gators have not left the state to play a non-conference, regular-season opponent since 1991 — more than a decade before he got there.

This year, Ohio State played every non-conference opponent at home (Marshall, Ohio, Eastern Michigan) and defeated struggling Miami from a very average ACC and had gimmes over underwhelming Purdue and Indiana.

As John Feinstein pointed out this week in The Washington Post, Ohio State's Big Ten co-champion Wisconsin defeated UNLV, San Jose State, Austin Peay and beat a 5-7 ASU team at home 20-19. The Big Ten's Michigan State played Western Michigan, Florida Atlantic and Northern Colorado.

Wrote Feinstein in an open letter to Gee:

"So let's get this straight: You and your conference brethren load up with non-conference creampuffs, then count on the BCS apologists to actually have the nerve to question TCU's resume even after the Horned Frogs finished 12-0 for the second season in a row. Boise State lost a great game on the road (last) Friday to a very good Nevada team (a team that crushed California, 52-31, a few weeks before the Bears lost to top-ranked Oregon, 15-13) and will finish 11-1. Where will the Broncos go? Not to a BCS bowl, you can be sure of that."

Here we are now, a week after Gee wandered into the BCS versus non-BCS argument and national championship debate by putting down TCU and Boise State because they didn't match his rule of nobility.

Then a serf gets invited to the castle.

A snap of the finger and the Big East invites TCU to join its AQ league with immediate rights in 2012 to a chance at a national championship, no longer needing to go undefeated to get a BCS bowl berth or jump through other BCS-imposed hurdles.

Good for TCU. And for Pac-10-bound Utah, it is a great move to be included in the BCS wonderland.

But isn't it just more than a little ironic: Gee had nothing but scorn for the Frogs a few days ago?

University presidents who control the NCAA, does any of this make sense to you?

Explain it to me with a straight face. Or do it like Gordon Gee.

e-mail: dharmon@desnews.com