The BCS is BS

Ah yes the holiday season is upon us again. And with that comes pumpkin pie, turkey, dressing, and of course the college football bowl season. Controversy out the wazoo naturally follows whenever anyone talks about the increasing, and increasingly pointless bowl games, more specifically: The Bowl Championship Series (BCS).
Here is the deal, fans across the country are tired of hearing that the regular season is the playoffs, and that the two best teams will be in the National Championship game at the end of the year. I don’t like it when 11-1 or even 10-2 teams from the BSC conferences such as the Big 12, SEC, or Pac 10 get into the National Championship game or a BCS bowl game, over a team who runs the table in a Mid-major such as the WAC, or Mountain West. Boise State proved to us all that a Mid-major can compete and win against a powerhouse. Recall that they beat a mighty Oklahoma Team in the 2007 Fiesta Bowl. Granted there have been a few years when the BCS does have it right, but more often then not they snub a team or two. How many more times does Ohio State need to get embarrassed in the National Championship game before the “experts” realize that they are overrated?
I personally think that there needs to be something done to fix this. And I have the solution. Adopt a playoff. Oh but what about how demanding the game of football is on the kids? Well the DII and DIII kids somehow are tough enough for a playoff. What about all the finals that the students must study for? Again the players in DII and DIII are able to get to their studies. What about the amount of money that the NCAA will lose without all their sponsors in the countless bowl games? Does the BCS really need all the money they get from the San Diego County Federal Credit Union for having a meaningless bowl game of the same name? If there were a playoff it would be simple enough to keep the Orange Bowl, Fiesta Bowl, Cotton Bowl, Rose Bowl, and the Sugar Bowl sponsors and have all of these great traditions in the semi-finals or quarter-finals of the playoff.
So what would a playoff look like? Well it would be very similar to the DII and DIII playoff systems. Select 32 teams and whittle them down to a national champion in a 31 game, 5 week long tournament. As a side-note; there are 34 bowl games scheduled for this year so those who believe a playoff would create too many games are flatly mistaken. Form a selection committee just like they have for March Madness who would pick out the teams using the AP poll and Coaches poll as guides. This could be done in a span of five weeks. If we start on December 20th, the current date set to kick off the bowl season, the tournament would run through January 17th.
One more thing- Division I college football is the only sport in the NCAA lacking a playoff system. In its current shackled state, college football already enjoys nearly universal popularity. Unchain the sport with a playoff system and it would surpass March madness and Super Bowl to become the most anticipated (and lucrative) sporting event of the year.