BCS Caspules: 'Bama and Texas: Blue bloods play for a title

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. — Nick Saban gave Mack Brown a cooler full of Alabama’s favorite, Dreamland Bar-B-Que. Brown presented Saban with a pair of genuine Texas spurs.

A quaint gesture, and a great photo op.

But the big prize — the one they really want — is that crystal trophy Brown and Saban posed with Wednesday, and it goes to the winner of the BCS national title game.

The undefeated Crimson Tide and Longhorns will each try to add another championship to their considerable pedigrees Thursday, a meeting that will pit All-American quarterback Colt McCoy of Texas against the player who beat him for the Heisman Trophy, running back Mark Ingram of Alabama.

"When you start with 120 teams and it’s down to two, that’s about 12,000 players," Brown said. "It’s a great honor for your players and your coaches to be in this game."

This is a matchup of two old-line programs from Southern states — Roll Tide vs. Hook ‘em Horns — where football, on many days, is bigger than life.

Saban, in his third year in Tuscaloosa, is aiming to bring the first championship to Alabama since 1992, when Gene Stallings — a protege of the late, great Bear Bryant — roamed the sidelines.

"We have a tremendous amount of respect for the tradition and the passion that our fans have," Saban said.

But, he said, tradition doesn’t win ball games, and early in his tenure Saban even bristled against the so-called "culture of expectations" that surrounds most everything involved with Alabama football.

Since then, he has tried to ignore the hype and has gone about doing what he did six years ago when he led LSU to the BCS title: recruiting top prospects, coaching them up, trying to turn them into good players, students and citizens.

"The rest of it really doesn’t affect that," Saban insisted.

In keeping with the tenor of the week, Brown was much more chit-chatty and loose than his counterpart during his portion of a coaches news conference sandwiched around the photo session. He described growing up in a small town in Tennessee and being as big a Bryant fan as anyone.

Now, he’s at Texas. Once derisively known as "Coach February" — the guy who could recruit all the talent in February but never cash in on it come January — Brown has won seven of his last eight bowl games, led the Longhorns (13-0) to one national title and can easily be mentioned in the same breath as their legendary coach, Darrell Royal.

Royal, 85, and the Bear, who died in 1983, were good friends — in fact, Royal showed Bryant how to run the wishbone — though the two rarely met on opposite sidelines. Texas is 7-0-1 all-time against Alabama, with the last meeting a 14-12 win in the 1982 Cotton Bowl, five years after Royal had retired with 184 wins.

"Coach Royal is still alive and has things named after him," Brown said. "I think Coach Bryant still walks the halls at Tuscaloosa, and he has things named after him. But everyone that sees that ‘A’ and sees the Longhorn knows the programs, and that’s what makes this game so special."

Brown continued with a theme he’s been building on all month — that the two best teams are meeting at the Rose Bowl and a true national champion will come out of the game.

It was a legitimate debate five weeks ago when the BCS pairings came out and there were five undefeated teams — Alabama, Texas, Cincinnati, TCU and Boise State. Since then, Cincinnati got blown out 51-24 by Florida in the Sugar Bowl and TCU lost 17-10 to Boise State in the Fiesta Bowl. It leaves the Broncos in Idaho as the only team with an argument — one they undoubtedly will not win.

Alabama (13-0) comes into the game as a 3½-point favorite, in part because the Tide was so much more impressive than Texas in its last game.

Led by Ingram on offense and a stifling defense anchored by 350-pound defensive lineman Terrence Cody, the Tide shut down Tim Tebow of Florida in a 32-13 crushing of the Gators in the Southeastern Conference title game.

Texas, meanwhile, beat Nebraska 13-12 in the Big 12 championship game, and only after officials put 1 second back on the clock following a pass McCoy threw out of bounds. That allowed Hunter Lawrence to kick the winning field goal, even though McCoy’s sloppy game management at the end nearly cost Texas a chance to win it all.

"I was sitting there, shocked, because Colt was clearly letting it get down too far," said ABC’s Brent Musburger, who called the Big 12 game and is in the booth again Thursday night. "That’s a big part of this game, obviously, because if he doesn’t get that second put back on there, they’re not here."

That game — and that day — essentially sealed the Heisman race. McCoy threw for 184 yards and three interceptions and got sacked nine times. Ingram ran for 113 yards and three touchdowns to become Alabama’s first Heisman winner.

Which sets up a very similar scenario as the last time Texas played at the Rose Bowl.

Back then, it was the Longhorns against Southern California in the weeks after Texas quarterback Vince Young lost the Heisman to USC’s Reggie Bush.

"They weren’t showing us no kind of respect at all, so we just kind of used that all as motivation until game-time came," said Young, who is expected to be on the sideline Thursday night.

Young had one of the best performances in college football history in a 41-38 win over USC — passing for 267 yards, running for 200 more and transforming himself into something more than just another great player to Texas fans, who have seen their share.

That’s the kind of thing that can happen to a player who leads his team a national title in Texas or Alabama, two states where football and life intersect 365 days a year.

"They tend to maybe idolize people who play football here, even though we’re just regular people," said Alabama kicker Leigh Tiffin, whose dad, Van, kicked for Alabama in the ‘80s.

In Texas, too.

"You’re under the microscope," said Longhorns left tackle Adam Ulatoski, who played at high school powerhouse Southlake Carroll near Fort Worth. "But it’s a little different when it’s a town watching you and the state of Texas watching you. It’s a little bit of pressure, but it’s a whole lot of fun."

Mack Brown’s successor happens to be a Saban clone

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. — Will Muschamp hasn’t spoken with his coaching mentor in months.

As the defensive coordinator and head coach designate for the Texas Longhorns, Muschamp is plenty busy, but he still likes to keep up with the guy who taught him so much. Problem is, the other coach is busy, too. And he’s old school — doesn’t text or e-mail or anything like that. So it’s understandable that months have passed without any contact.

Finally, on Thursday night, a few hours before the BCS championship game, they’ll have a brief reunion on the field of the Rose Bowl, sharing a hug and spending a few minutes catching up on things.

Then Muschamp will go to the Texas sideline, Alabama coach Nick Saban will go to his sideline and they’ll spend the next few hours trying to outsmart each other.

"I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I wouldn’t be where I am if it weren’t for the opportunities that Nick gave me," Muschamp said. "I’ve got the utmost respect for him."

Muschamp was 29 and coming off his first season as the defensive coordinator at Division II Valdosta State when Saban hired him at LSU. A year later, Muschamp became the defensive coordinator, and the year after that the Tigers won the national championship. Then Saban went to the Miami Dolphins and Muschamp followed as his defensive coordinator, even though some of the players were older than him.

One year later, Muschamp went back to college, leading the Auburn defense. Saban ended up at rival Alabama and they went head-to-head for the first and only time in 2007.

Longhorns fans, take note. The scorecard in their personal rivalry reads Muschamp 1, Saban 0.

"I know Will is looking forward to it," said Cowboys linebacker Bradie James, who played for LSU during the Saban-Muschamp years and remains close with both coaches. "I know Will definitely wants to beat him. They definitely have a friendly type of rivalry. It’ll be good."

Considering Muschamp is somewhat of a Saban clone, it’s no surprise that Texas and Alabama run similar schemes — and have similar results.

The No. 2 Longhorns have the stingiest run defense in the country, allow the third-fewest yards and the eighth-fewest points. The No. 1 Crimson Tide are top seven in every major defensive category.

"I think philosophically and schematically we believe a lot of the same things," Muschamp said. "We believe the same way to coach and motivate, so I think that’s probably why we got along."

Saban’s influence on Muschamp was evident the second he began talking about this game. Before the first question was even asked, Muschamp muttered, "I’m afraid there’s going to be a lot of wasted ink over this situation."

Then he launched into the story behind their teacher-student relationship.

In late December 2000, LSU was in Atlanta getting ready for the Peach Bowl and Muschamp was in Atlanta visiting relatives. He decided to also visit some of his friends on the LSU staff and showed up to a walkthrough practice on Christmas, and met Saban for the first time.

"We were just talking about my experience, where I’ve been and what I was doing and just kind of hit it off," Muschamp said.

A few weeks later, LSU needed a linebackers coach. Saban wanted someone young, from the South and with ties to the staff. Muschamp’s buddies said something along the lines of, "Remember our pal you met at the Peach Bowl?"

"So they brought me in for an interview," Muschamp said. "That night he offered me the job."

Muschamp made a pretty quick impression on the folks at Texas, too.

He arrived in 2008 and before his first season was done, his salary was spiked from $425,000 to $900,000 and he was deemed the eventual successor to coach Mack Brown.

While Muschamp is proud to be part of Saban’s coaching tree, he’s also very much his own man.

For instance, can you picture Saban flying in the air to chest-bump a player? Muschamp does it all the time. He set a tone in his very first game at Texas by angrily ripping off his headset so violently he gashed his left cheek, sending blood rolling onto his chin; it stayed there as he was more concerned with fixing the mistake than cleaning his face.

One of his guiding principles is that he wants his players to be a reflection of him, and that means being intense during games.

"I’d never seen a coach head butt a guy in the middle of his chest before a game," defensive tackle Lamarr Houston said. "We got used to it, and it’s how we play. ... It’s rubbed off on us a lot this year."

Muschamp is a classic Jekyll-and-Hyde type of coach, someone who can be wild on the field and caring as can be off it. The bond he builds with each player is why they want to become reflections of him.

"He can be your friend, your brother, like a second parent if you want him to be," pass rusher Sergio Kindle said. "You can call any time of day, any time at night, he’ll get up and answer it and talk to you. That’s the kind of thing you need in a coach, not just give you the Xs and Os, but you know, life lessons."

-- Jaime Aron

McClain heart and soul of ‘Bama’s defense

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. — Rolando McClain had already given his pledge to play for Alabama when coach Mike Shula was fired. The hotly recruited linebacker stuck to his word after Nick Saban’s hiring.

Why? Because, he said at the time, "I think he can bring a national championship here." Four years later, McClain is a big reason why Saban and the top-ranked Crimson Tide have that chance Thursday night against No. 2 Texas.

He’s the unquestioned leader of the nation’s top scoring defense, a fast, rangy, powerful 6-foot-4 258-pounder who is savvy enough the coaches seek out his input for difficult defensive challenges.

Against Virginia Tech, McClain offered his suggestions for "ways to keep Tyrod Taylor uncomfortable pressure-wise and quarterback spies and things like that," recalls fellow inside linebacker Dont’a Hightower, out with a knee injury.

"That’s just something I couldn’t ever see because coach Saban knows so much. He’s been around so much he just knows the game so well. I don’t think there’s anybody that knows the game as well as coach Saban does."

McClain comes the closest of anybody on the field for Alabama. He was ailing with a stomach virus on Tuesday and limited in practice. But Saban said his star linebacker and backup defensive back Rod Woodson were better by Wednesday and would go through the afternoon walk-through with the team.

"If they continue to improve, they should be able to participate in the game," Saban said.

That’s a big deal for a defense charged with trying to defend players like Texas quarterback Colt McCoy, wide receiver Jordan Shipley and tailback Tre’ Newton.

Incidentally, Alabama held the dual-threat Taylor to 65 total yards in that opener with Virginia Tech. While it would be impossible to quantify the impact of McClain’s "coaching" in that game or others, it’s easier to measure his importance to the Tide’s defense against the Longhorns and during the season.

He’s the leading tackler, a team captain, an All-American and the Butkus Award winner as college football’s best linebacker. Plus, he has mastered Saban’s complex schemes and figures to be a central figure in keeping the Tide defense on task Thursday night.

"He literally is the quarterback of the defense," end Lorenzo Washington said. "He gets the front right, he gets the defensive backs right, he gets the linebackers right. And everything starts and ends with him, every play."

The Tide’s defense is loaded with All-Americans and NFL prospects, leading the nation in scoring defense and pass defense efficiency and ranking among the top seven in each of the major categories.

There’s run-stopping, space-clogging nose guard Terrence Cody and cornerback Javier Arenas — both first-team All-Americans and projected NFL first-round picks. Ball-hawking safety Mark Barron has a Southeastern Conference-leading seven interceptions and was a third-team AP All-American in his first season as a starter.

Then there’s mostly unheralded pass rushing threats like end Marcell Dareus and linebacker Eryk Anders, who have combined for 11½ sacks.

McClain is the heart of the defense, though. Sometimes it even seems like he’s channeling Saban. Both are ultra-focused and intense perfectionists.

"He’s just like coach Saban on the field," Hightower said.

McClain was the centerpiece of Saban’s first recruiting class, and he’s one of the few players who is generally exempt from Saban’s tongue lashings. The yelling stopped about a week into McClain’s first fall camp in Tuscaloosa.

"It’s because I beat myself up so bad," McClain said earlier this season. "When I make a mistake, I’m on myself worse than he can (be). It’s hard for him to yell at me when I’m yelling at myself."

McClain spends hours combing through film of opposing offenses. Like Saban, he’s more about the big game than the fun and festivities. At Disneyland, he said he didn’t even go on any rides but enjoyed the ESPN Zone. Mainly he savors the company.

"Outside of my family, I don’t want to be anywhere but with my teammates," McClain said. "I’m always relaxed and casual there."

This could be McClain’s final college game. He is considered a first-round NFL lock if he opts to skip his senior season, though McClain has dodged that question.

His position coach, James Willis, calls McClain "a freak of nature" athletically, but also figures the junior has the Saban-like laser focus that will keep the NFL or the awards from being a distraction.

"He’s so focused on the game, he doesn’t even talk about it," said Willis, a former NFL linebacker. "That’s where you understand his maturity level and his whole focus. The whole thing about the Butkus Award, he didn’t talk about it. He didn’t want to talk about it.

"He wanted to talk about the team. That’s why I think he’s special."

-- John Zenor

SEC goes for 4 straight championships

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. — Julio Jones was asked about the Texas defense and repeated the answer that so many of his Alabama teammates have given leading up to the BCS national championship game.

"It’s just like an SEC team, how they play the game," the Tide receiver said earlier this week.

As if there was no greater compliment than comparing the Longhorns to South Carolina or Kentucky. As if the greatest praise one could bestow upon on a college football team is declaring that, yes, this team could play in the Southeastern Conference.

Competing in a league that has produced three consecutive national champions — something never done before — certainly helps justify Alabama’s high opinion of the SEC.

And it’s a feeling shared by many, though somewhat begrudgingly.

"The SEC is the best conference," ESPN analyst Kirk Herbstreit said Wednesday. "But I do sense just from a fan’s perspective once you get outside the region, it is the SEC versus the world."

So it’s safe to say that more than just Texas fans would like to see the Longhorns take Alabama — and with it the SEC — down a peg Thursday night in the Rose Bowl, denying the league a fourth straight title.

SEC football dates back to 1933 and in many ways it unifies the Deep South like nothing else. As fierce as the rivalries are within the conference, fans and players are passionate in their support for each other when teams step outside the league.

"It’s almost become a fraternity of the South," Alabama tight end Colin Peek said. "I have a lot of friends at Florida who all want to see us win. They almost want to say the national championship game is decided on Dec. 5 in Atlanta."

SEC football has never been more popular or more lucrative. The conference distributed $132.5 million to its 12 members last year, the majority of which came from the television rights for football.

Those figures are a lock to go up this year as the money starts pouring in from the league’s new 15-year TV deals with ESPN and CBS.

"I think one of the things that sort of sets the SEC out a little bit is the great TV package and great exposure that we get with having as many as three games on national TV every week," Tide coach Nick Saban said.

On TV and at the bank, the SEC can claim another season as No. 1 in college football. Saban said the SEC’s depth is what separates it from other leagues.

"Where most leagues have two or three or four good teams, our league seems to have seven, eight or nine or 10 sometimes," he said.

This year, while Alabama and Florida have clearly been among the top three or four teams in the country all along, though the rest of the league hasn’t been quite so scary.

Heading into the bowl season, in fact, LSU was the only other SEC team ranked in the AP Top 25.

And this hasn’t been a banner postseason for the SEC. The league put 10 teams in bowls and its record stands at 5-4 heading into the BCS championship game. That includes Arkansas’ overtime victory against an East Carolina team that missed four field goals and Auburn’s overtime win as a touchdown-favorite against Northwestern.

But the bottom line is that an SEC team, again, will play for the national title on the final night of the season.

"Our most difficult challenge is maintaining the success we’ve had over the years," SEC commissioner Mike Slive said.

Last year, the Big 12 seemed as if it might have surpassed the SEC, but a disappointing bowl season combined with Florida’s victory against Oklahoma in the BCS title game made it hard to dispute that King Football still reigned in the South.

This season, the Big 12 slipped even further than the SEC, with Oklahoma and Texas Tech unable to match last year’s success.

The Big 12’s troubles led to increased scrutiny of Texas. Some critics even questioned whether the Longhorns were indeed one of the two best teams in the country, especially after Texas’ 13-12 victory against Nebraska in the Big 12 championship game.

Following that game Texas coach Mack Brown made sure to point out that in the SEC that type of defensive struggle would be touted as a thing of beauty.

"We have not had as many good teams in the Big 12 (as in the SEC)," said Brown, who grew up in Tennessee. "We’ve had some great teams."

The problem for the Big 12 — and the Big Ten and the Pac-10, etc., etc. — is that lately the very best teams have played in the SEC.

-- Ralph D. Russo

Notebook: Freshman would likely get nod if McElroy gets hurt

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. — Who will step in if Alabama quarterback Greg McElroy goes down? Coach Nick Saban said he’s "pretty certain" it would be freshman A.J. McCarron, who hasn’t taken a college snap and is in line for a redshirt year.

Redshirt freshman Star Jackson has handled the mop-up duty in blowouts, playing in five games and going 13-of-18 passing for 116 yards without a touchdown or interception. But McCarron passed him up during the bye week after the Oct. 24 game with Tennessee.

Saban said a national title would be worth a player losing a year of eligibility, if it comes down to that.

"It’s been our plan that if we had to play him, then we’ll play the guy that gives us the best opportunity to win the game and that’s what we would do," Saban said. "Star Jackson is also an option for us. We’ve gotten this far. I think in fairness to everyone, we’d put the guy in the game that would give us the best opportunity to win."

McCarron is a 6-foot-4, 190-pounder who passed for 6,066 yards and 66 touchdowns with just nine interceptions as a three-year starter at Saint Paul’s in Mobile, Ala.

FAMOUS ALUMS

Former Texas running back Priest Holmes was so impressed by this year’s Longhorns team that he was willing to help his brother move across the country.

Holmes’ brother was taking a moving van to Los Angeles this week, so he offered to go along for the ride just to be in the area for the national championship game. He told some school officials he was going to be here and they arranged for him to be a guest speaker at practice Tuesday.

Holmes told the Longhorns that watching them from afar he could tell what great chemistry they have.

Although Holmes didn’t have tickets when he headed to California, the team has taken care of that. The Longhorns are expecting 26 alums who’ve played in the NFL to be at the game — including Vince Young, the star of the 2005 and ‘06 Rose Bowl victories.

Young, former Heisman Trophy winner Ricky Williams and Michael Huff, the defensive MVP of the ‘06 game, are the only ones likely to be on the sideline.

"It’s fun to have them back," coach Mack Brown said of all the NFL players.

HAPPY RETURNS

Punts and kickoffs won’t be a good time for a bathroom break or snack run. Both Alabama and Texas have dangerous return men.

The Tide’s Javier Arenas needs 29 yards to break Wes Welker’s NCAA record for career punt return yards (1,761) and already owns the SEC mark with seven punts returned for touchdowns. That’s one shy of the NCAA standard shared by Welker and Oklahoma’s Antonio Perkins.

Texas counters with three dangerous return men. Punt returner Jordan Shipley has two touchdowns on returns this season, while D.J. Monroe (two) and Marquise Goodwin (one) both have taken kicks the distance.

"They’re probably as good as anybody that we’ve played against" in both areas, Saban said. "As a punt returner, Shipley is really a good decision maker, good quickness. He can make the first guy miss."

On kick returns, "They have tremendous speed in both of their return guys. If you give these guys a seam, they’re going to get off to the races and it’s going to be pretty hard to sort of manage that."

Kick coverage has at times been one of Alabama’s few weak points. The Tide gave up two long returns for touchdowns early in the season, but has been less vulnerable lately.

Brown figures the strengths of the defenses could make big returns even more important. The Longhorns lead the nation with a school-record 11 non-offensive touchdowns.

"You never know in a game like this what’s going to turn the game around," Brown said.

MACK THE MOTIVATOR

Before Texas played Southern Cal in the 2006 Rose Bowl, Brown found the inspiration for his pregame speech from — of all places — "The Jerry Springer Show."

Speaking to reporters Wednesday, he talked about the challenge of providing those words of wisdom.

"I’ll have 122 sets of eyes looking at me, an entire staff looking at me tomorrow afternoon at about 2:00 wanting me to put some sense into how important this game is," he said. "What can you say in a five-minute period to relax them and make sure they’re focused when they’ve had a month and two days to prepare for this?"

He also seemed to use Wednesday’s news conference as a chance to test out his message.

"‘I want you focused, I want you tough, I want you ready to play, but I want you to have fun’ — which gets really contradictory when they’re looking at you," he said. "‘Is it important, Coach? Yeah, it’s the National Championship. You’re the best at what you do in the country, and you’ve got three and a half hours to prove it. You want to respect Alabama, but you don’t want to have your team where they’re not sure that they think you think they can win, because they have to know myself and our coaches think we can win.’ So all of those things go through your mind."

NFL? NO THANKS

Alabama’s Nick Saban has coached in the NFL several times, including as a head coach. Now he’s back in college football, perhaps to stay.

Brown has never made the leap, and probably never will.

"At one time it was compelling," he said Wednesday. "If I coached somewhere else, I’d have to be in complete control, and I think that’s what you get in college football. You get to make the decisions within the structure of your athletic director and your president."

He also prefers college kids answering to him out of loyalty to trying to get multimillionaires to answer to him.

"I also was told one time that don’t ever coach a player that you can’t buy a house in his neighborhood, and that makes sense," he said. "I’ve heard the Joe Namath stories where Dan Henning was coaching him and Dan jumped on Joe, and the head coach said, ‘OK, now, we’ve sold all these tickets, are they coming to see you or him.’ So I do understand it’s different."

TV TALK

The BCS moves to ESPN next season, but it has already said goodbye to Fox after four years with that network.

Because the Rose Bowl has a separate TV deal from the rest of the BCS games, ABC will broadcast Thursday night’s BCS title game between No. 1 Alabama and No. 2 Texas.

ESPN paid $125 million for the TV rights to the Fiesta, Orange and Sugar bowls, as well as the BCS title games, from 2011-14. ABC will continue to be the home of the Rose Bowl during that time.

Fox’s BCS deal ran from 2007-10 and was worth $80 million.

ESPN runs ABC Sports, so for that network, this season’s game is in a way the first of a new era for the BCS on TV.

"To be able to have two games this year through our good friends at the Pasadena Tournament of Roses in the Rose Bowl game and the championship game here in California is special for us to ... get a jump-start on our full new BCS relationship next year," said Burke Magnus, ESPN senior vice president for college sports programming.

Brent Musberger will handle play-by-play for the game Thursday night, with Kirk Herbstreit doing analysis.

Dave Miller, senior coordinating producer for sports programming at ESPN, said 30 cameras will be used for the BCS championship game.

Technology makes BCS tickets a click away

Mark McNeil needed tickets for Thursday night’s BCS national title game: 31 seats at the Rose Bowl, to be exact.

In the old days — as recently as a few years ago — he would have had to call brokers and take a chance that the tickets were not worthless scraps of paper. Now, he just ordered through RazorGator.com to get the inventory he needed for resales through his company, Pennsylvania-based Premier Luxury Rentals.

"You can do a higher volume because you really get an opportunity to see what’s really out there in real time, and it reduces the possibilities of fraud," McNeil said. "Before, when you deal with a ticket broker, you really didn’t know who his contact was and you really had to rely on his word."

Technology has indeed changed the world of tickets, from high rollers such as the clients of McNeil’s company — which arranges getaways, private jets and chartered yachts — to a family just looking for a trip to a big game. Tickets can be purchased as gametime approaches with the convenience of a mouse click.

Patrick Debusk, a 44-year-old oil refinery contractor from Houston, is one fan who used StubHub.com to buy a pair of tickets for the BCS championship between top-ranked Alabama and No. 2 Texas. He’ll be traveling to Pasadena, Calif., on Thursday with his wife Marty, a 1993 graduate of the University of Texas School of Law, and sitting about nine rows up along the 40-yard line.

Debusk paid way over the $275 list price for his two seats. He also used StubHub to purchase tickets for the 2005 World Series between the Houston Astros and Chicago White Sox and the 2004 Super Bowl between New England and Carolina at Houston’s Reliant Stadium.

Quite different from an experience at Boston’s Fenway Park about seven years ago, when he thought he was getting good seats through a reliable broker and wound up sitting behind the Pesky Pole in right field. Now he knows the exact location and receives his tickets by e-mail or Federal Express — unless he prefers that they be left for him at the stadium.

"If you want to go to the game and you’re willing to pay, they’re going to come through with a good seat, and the tickets will be easy to get," he said.

FanSnap.com, a search engine that pulls together information from dozens of online ticket sellers, said there were 3,000 BCS tickets available at the start of the week, with prices starting at about $600, the average at $1,000 and some seats going for $2,200, spokesman Christian Anderson said.

StubHub’s average sale price for the game has been $943, up from $684 for last year’s game between Florida and Oklahoma in Miami, according to spokeswoman Joellen Ferrer said. By Tuesday it was the company’s fifth-highest-grossing event behind World Series Games 6 and 2 last year, last year’s Super Bowl and the 2009 World Series opener.

But in a recessionary time, there’s a limit to what fans will pay. Just ask the Yankees and Mets fans who couldn’t resell their seats for close to list at New York’s pricey new ballparks last year. The infamous Legends seats, sold by the Yankees to season ticket holders at $500 to $2,500 per game, often could be had on the days of games at 50 percent discounts or higher. Many of the seats near the field sat empty — or were given away by the Yankees — while the upper deck was packed every night.

Jason Berger, chief executive officer of AllShows.com and a past president of the National Association Of Ticket Brokers, said his company had sold more New York baseball tickets in 2009 than the previous year but that the dollar volume was down.

"There was just such an oversaturation of product on the market. There was just so much competition," he said. "Since they increased the price of tickets almost 200 percent on some of the locations, there was no ability for people to resell their tickets."

Team executives have been nervously watching the rate of season ticket renewals. The Mets, coming off a terrible first season at Citi Field, extended their deadline for decisions. For many teams, buyers of season plans no longer can be assured of selling excess seats at a profit.

"In the ticket market, like any other, the market prices are the function of the balance of buyers and sellers, and we’re at historic levels of sellers," said Michael Janes, the chief executive officer of FanSnap and formerly chief marketing officer of StubHub.

Still, there don’t seem to be any brakes for big events. StubHub’s average sale price for the Rose Bowl between Oregon and Ohio State was $374, followed by the Orange Bowl at $176, Fiesta Bowl at $163, and Sugar Bowl at $156.

RazorGator, the BCS’s official resale company, has sold at least 78 percent more tickets for this year’s game than last year’s championship.

"The BCS ticket prices went way up when the teams were announced," RazorGator CEO Brendan Ross said, who believes fans’ confidence in the resale system has made the market much stronger.

For the Super Bowl in Miami on Feb. 7, resale tickets start with an $1,100 asking price and currently average $3,000, Anderson said. StubHub’s average sale price for last year’s Super Bowl between Arizona and Pittsburgh in Tampa, Fla., was $2,403.

McNeil is looking to purchase 100 Super Bowl tickets. He will package them with three nights hotel, air transportation and ground transportation, pricing the ducats at $4,000 per seat.

"Last year, we saw a decline in prices for both the NFL playoffs and college bowl games, due largely to consumer price sensitivity with the recession. This year, we are seeing increased demand across the board," StubHub’s Ferrer said. "A year ago, many fans attending events skewed toward the lower price points; this time around, we are seeing the full spectrum of tickets being purchased."

And the business figures to grow.

Forrester, a research firm that following the ticket industry, forecasts the U.S. secondary market for sports and concerts on the Web will grow 12 percent annually and reach $4.5 billion in 2012. Berger, of AllShows.com, thinks social networks will add a new, even faster dimension to the business.

It’s all come a long way from scalpers standing across the street from stadiums.

-- Ronald Blum

Unbeaten Boise State out of the mix — for now

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. — The second 14-0 team in modern college football history is back in Idaho, ready to watch Texas and Alabama play for the national title.

In the BCS universe, the Boise State Broncos might as well be on Mars. If you’re not in the Rose Bowl on Thursday night, forget about the national championship.

But while the Broncos were left out of the mix this time, they might not be all that far from a shot at the national title.

"Nothing happens overnight," Boise State coach Chris Petersen said after the Broncos wrapped up their perfect season Monday with a 17-10 Fiesta Bowl victory over Texas Christian.

Indeed, it could happen within the confines of the oft-vilified BCS, even as congressmen call for change and playoff advocates launch a televised ad campaign.

The Broncos return 21 of 22 starters next season. And with Virginia Tech and Oregon State on their schedule, the Broncos will have a chance to parry any strength-of-schedule questions presented by the feeble Western Athletic Conference.

"If we could beat the teams on our schedule, we would jump dramatically," Petersen said.

Playoff advocates argue that the Broncos shouldn’t have to wait to play for No. 1. Their resume, which includes a win over Pac-10 champion Oregon, is as spotless as those sported by top-ranked Alabama and No. 2 Texas.

But not even the Broncos were demanding a shot at the championship after they beat TCU with a workmanlike, somewhat uninspiring, performance. Asked if he thought Boise State should be No. 1, Broncos tight end Kyle Efaw replied, "Probably not. But I mean, maybe next year."

Maybe. That’s a step up from "never," which would have described Boise State’s chances when the BCS opened in the 1998 season.

The Broncos have even made progress from January 2007, when some regarded Boise State as a colorful novelty act after its exhilarating Fiesta Bowl victory over Oklahoma. It was symbolic that the Broncos had to check out of their resort hotel the next day to make room for the Florida Gators, who had arrived to face Ohio State in the title game.

Now that the Broncos are 2-0 in the BCS — matching the combined victory total for Penn State, Michigan and Notre Dame — they no longer have to beg to play with the big boys.

The only question is whether they’ll have a chance to play for the big prize.

A playoff might make that possible — assuming the WAC and its ilk would be guaranteed a slot.

"I know a lot of people think they have the perfect answer, but when you put it down on the paper and try to figure out how to get those things done, there’s problems with it," Petersen said.

By dodging the playoff debate, Petersen took a sharply contrasting approach from the previous Fiesta Bowl winner. After Texas beat Ohio State last January, Mack Brown said he would vote his one-loss team No. 1.

One year later, Brown doesn’t have to stump, having earned a berth in this year’s title game, however narrowly. But Brown still wants see a different system, even if he hasn’t offered a foolproof alternative.

"When I voice my opinion, usually someone has an opinion of my opinion and then it goes away the next day and we go back to the system," Brown said this week.

"I don’t think what we’ve got is best for college football," he said. "I’d like to keep working and tweaking and see if we can get the best teams to play at the end."

The BCS is all about tweaking. Perhaps the most important tweak came when it bowed to congressional pressure and added a fifth game, improving access for Boise State and others who don’t have an automatic bid.

The Broncos have made the most of that access, as has Mountain West Conference power Utah, also 2-0 in the BCS.

Anyone remember whom the Utes beat by 14 points in the Sugar Bowl a year ago?

Oh, yeah: Alabama, which is in the title game one year later.

With every victory by a BCS buster, the possibility of one of them playing for a national title seems a little less remote.

Consider the company Boise State joined when it became the second 14-0 team in modern history.

The first was Ohio State, the 2002 national champion. The third will be either the Crimson Tide or the Longhorns.

Ohio State, Alabama, Texas and ... Boise State?

Petersen was asked if this was a dream season for the Broncos or if there was still "one more thing" out there for the Broncos.

"It is a dream season because we can only beat the teams on our schedule," Petersen said. "And so we don’t even think about anything other than that."

This time next year, they may have to.

-- Andrew Bagnato

BCS championship game glance

No. 1 Alabama (13-0) vs. No. 2 Texas (13-0), 7:38 p.m. (ABC)

Line: Alabama by 4.

Series Record: Texas leads 7-0-1

Last meeting: 1982 Cotton Bowl, Texas 14-12.

What's At Stake

Two of college football's most storied and tradition-rich programs try to add a national championship crystal ball to their trophy cases. For the Crimson Tide, it would be the first national championship since 1992 and be a culmination of sorts for Nick Saban's quick restoration of Alabama football. Saban would also be the first coach in the poll era to win national championships with two teams. Mack Brown and the Longhorns are going for their second national title in five seasons.

Key Matchup

Alabama defensive line vs. Texas offensive line. OT Adam Ulatoski, C Chris Hall and the Longhorns' blockers are coming off their worst game of the season. They allowed nine sacks against Ndamukong Suh and Nebraska in the Big 12 title game. Now the question is: How will they hold up against massive NG Terrence Cody and all those blitzes that Saban and defensive coordinator Kirby Smart conjure up.

Players to Watch

Alabama: LB Rolando McClain. The 258-pound All-American makes plays all over the field. He led the Tide in tackles (101) and had four sacks and two interceptions. He is also like a coach on the field, directing his teammates into the right spots. But he was fighting an illness earlier in the week and how much that will affect him won't be known until the game is played.

Texas: QB Colt McCoy. The two-time Heisman finalist completed 70 percent of his passes and was also the team's second-leading rusher with 348 yards. It's unlikely Texas' inconsistent running game will find traction against Alabama, so the Longhorns' hopes are firmly in McCoy's hands.

Facts & Figures

Alabama TB Mark Ingram is the eighth Heisman Trophy winner to play in the BCS championship game. Six of the previous seven were on the losing end of the title game. ... Alabama ranks No. 2 in the nation in total defense at 241 yards allowed per game and Texas is No. 3 at 251 yards allowed per game. The Longhorns' run defense ranks No. 1 in the nation at 62 yards allowed per game and 'Bama is No. 2 at 78 yards allowed per game. ... Texas WR Jordan Shipley caught 106 passes, more than the combined total of the Longhorns' second- and third-leading receivers (James Kirkendoll with 48 and Dan Buckner with 44).