Hypothetical 2007 BCS Playoffs

This season started with Division I-AA (Football Championship Subdivision) power Appalachian State upsetting No. 5 Michigan at the Big House in Ann Arbor. The year ended with four-win Pittsburgh knocking out No. 2 West Virginia at the Backyard Brawl in Morgantown. If there has ever been a college football season that needed to end in a NCAA Tournament-style playoff, this is definitely it.

There are countless suggestions for the format of a hypothetical college football playoff — including a plus-one game, a four-team playoff, an eight-team playoff, etc.

In this particular mock BCS playoff, we’ve decided to go with a 16-team bracket including 11 conference champions and five at-large teams. There are six BCS champs — Ohio State (Big Ten), LSU (SEC), USC (Pac-10), Oklahoma (Big 12), Virginia Tech (ACC) and West Virginia (Big East) — as well as five non-BCS conference champions — Hawaii (WAC), BYU (Mountain West), UCF (Conference USA), FAU (Sun Belt) and Central Michigan (MAC).

The five at-large berths were debatable. The results were Georgia, Florida, Missouri, Kansas and Illinois. The final "bubble teams" to be cut were Arizona State, Tennessee, Boston College and Boise State. Just like in college basketball’s NCAA Tournament, not every good team can make the field.

But the teams that did make the tournament would provide several match-ups that the regular season did not provide.

In-conference, Big 12 South champ Oklahoma would face Big 12 North runner-up Kansas in a game that never happened in 2007. The same for SEC West champ LSU and SEC East runner-up Georgia, if both teams were able to advance past the first round of the BCS's "Big Dance."

Individually, Florida’s Tim Tebow and West Virginia’s Pat White would provide a duel of dual-threat quarterbacks, while Hawaii’s Colt Brennan and Missouri’s Chase Daniel would showcase two of the most accurate and prolific arms in the country.

Who knows? Ohio State and LSU might meet each other in the final game. But at least USC, Oklahoma, Georgia, Virginia Tech or any other team would have a shot at winning the BCS national title.

The following is a hypothetical BCS playoff bracket, done March Madness-style: