Go Big 10 and go Ohio. Only 4 states sent 4 or more teams to bowl games and we were one of them (CA, FL, and TX were the others). 1-3 isn't the record I was hoping for but the important team won.
I think all of us lose sight of the fact that all college teams have 100% turnover every 4 years, that's why stats aren't that meaningful in college. Things can change so dramatically from one year to the next. Look at Appalachian State (WHO?) beating Michigan or the Mighty Oregon State Beavers taking out UCLA, you never know what's going to happen from one game to the next, let alone from one year to the next.
Isn't that what makes it fun though?
Very good point. The other thing to look at is the way success creates a recruiting cycle that looks a lot like the business schedule. Just look at schools like Florida State that were perennial top 10 schools but are strugging. The other side of the coin is a school like Boise State that has come from relative obscurity (on the national level) to BCS.
In the absence of something like a recruiting violation which isn't part of the norm (ok, that might be debatable, but you know what I mean) it usually looks a little like this.
School A is a successful team that does very well recruiting, keeping them successful.
Each year a large number of highly recruited freshmen sign up and join the program.
These freshmen are good enough that they either start for 4 years or 3.
After a couple of years of this freshmen looking at school A see that their position is 3 deep in students that will probably be starting ahead of them 3 or 4 years. They would love to go to school A but would rather go to school B and have a better chance at starting for a slightly less succesful program then almost certainly sitting behind a star at school A.
School B is able to build a team able to compete for the BCS after a couple of years because of this trend and is now on the level of school B
School A meanwhile has a very lean recruiting class (comparatively of course) because of the phenomenon above and slips below school B in the process.
Schools A and B switch places and the cycle repeats. This is why schools like FSU, Miami, Ohio State, Texas, USC, and other top tier teams seem to go in and out of being the top teams. It is rare they fall out of the top 25 and if they do it is usually short term, but it keeps them competitive while also keeping long term dynasties from forming. The teams like TCU and Boise State have much longer cycles because of recruiting power and prestige but they also go through it.
