A long last, we've reached the end of the bowl bonanza

GLENDALE, Ariz. — So here we sit at the intersection of controversy and anticipation, awaiting resolution on the issue of who's the best in college football. Nice that they could get us an answer before NCAA basketball's Selection Sunday.

Tonight in the new desert stadium, we find out whether Florida's defense has the chops to harness Heisman Trophy winner Troy Smith, receiver Ted Ginn and some dynamic Ohio State teammates. Or whether Michigan's ineptitude in the Rose Bowl might also offer clues about Ohio State's mortality.

We've chugged to the conclusion of the most flatulent bowl manifest in history (burp; 32 games' worth) and learned at least a few things amid the continuing playoff-versus-bowls debate:

• At 80, JoePa still has it (Penn State upset Tennessee in the Outback Bowl), even viewing in the press box with a bum leg.

• While brainstorming its latest uniform ensemble, Oregon (38-8 flop against BYU) ought to ponder why it became one of the big disappointments of the season.

• First-year head coach Bret Bielema (mild upset over Arkansas, capping a 12-1 season) is the hottest thing in Wisconsin since sharp cheddar.

• USC's Pete Carroll (beatdown of Michigan in a tossup game) could win a six-pack of national titles if he doesn't get lured back to the NFL.

• There's a new sheriff in the Pac-10 — OK, a deputy — and he wears orange and black. Oregon State's Mike Riley helped author one of the season's most shocking turnarounds to 10 victories. He only embellished his cachet — remember, the Beavers had enough athletes to beat USC — by successfully going for two to beat Missouri at the wire.

• Halley's Comet is due to be visible again on Earth in 2062, by which time Notre Dame might have won another bowl game.

Here's a question not so easily answered about the college gridscape: Whatever are the school presidents thinking?

Lead story in the NCAA News, Nov. 6, 2006, headlined, "Task Force cues presidents to take fiscal reform home":

"NCAA president Myles Brand called for institutional accountability in athletics budgets and more attention to integrating intercollegiate athletics within the campus environment during a speech to the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

"Brand's remarks christened the new report from the Presidential Task Force on the Future of Division I Intercollegiate Athletics, a 50-member panel appointed 18 months ago to address fiscal trends that, if left unchecked, could 'islandize' athletics from the campus-based educational mission."

So, to celebrate the release of that report, Alabama just went out and threw $32 million, guaranteed, to Nick Saban, who is absolutely, unequivocally, indubitably, without-a-freakin'-question-OK going to be the Tide coach until he retires, or until a better gig comes along.

The salary scale for coaches just got stretched again. Many college presidents are like some major-league baseball owners, unable to help themselves, talking a good game but all too willing to bow to what they call the "market."

Fortunately for Boise State, the bazaar for college coaching hires is all but shut down for another year, or the Broncos could be seeing the last of their first-year head coach, Chris Petersen.

How to make sense of what Petersen's Broncos did to climax their BCS-crashing season? Some commentators were almost breathless in saying Boise's 13-0 run means renewed sentiment for a playoff system, or at least an oncoming spike by the "mid-majors."

Not so fast. The guess here is that while Boise State's magical finish was enthralling, scintillating and one for the ages, it's mostly without deeper meaning beyond Boise.

What the Broncos have done is distance themselves from the mid-majors, much as Gonzaga did in basketball with three consecutive Sweet 16s from 1999-2001. That didn't legitimize mid-majors, it legitimized Gonzaga.

As long as Boise State is playing a WAC schedule, it doesn't have a claim to the national title, not when it played Louisiana Tech, New Mexico State and Idaho in consecutive weeks, while simultaneously Florida was meeting Louisiana State, Auburn and Georgia.

Say this for the Broncos: While they're rightfully famous for flimflamming Oklahoma at the finish, they should also be remembered for pounding on the Sooners most of the night until they let them back in the game with a fluke misplay on a punt. They belonged.

That marvelous ending suggests that even in the grating absence of a playoff, there's an element of devil-may-care beauty to the bowls. They're largely for style, not substance. The pressure of a playoff, the stakes, are mostly missing, so coaches take chances they probably wouldn't otherwise.

It adds to the compelling diversity of a game that is thriving. We'll see some of it tonight when Ohio State goes five-wides (Woody Hayes never mentioned that at clinics) and Florida executes zone-read and shuttles quarterbacks Chris Leak and Tim Tebow.

Good stuff, most of it. A lot better than what happens off the field.

Bud Withers: 206-464-8281 or bwithers@seattletimes.com