As Butler prepares for its second consecutive appearance in the NCAA Basketball Tournament National Championship game, college football fans are left to fantasize about what a similar playoff format could mean for mid-major schools that have been universally excluded from competing in the BCS title game.

While college basketball's playoff system is thriving, NCAA football's Bowl Championship Series is mired in an embarrassing scandal in which Fiesta Bowl officials allegedly misappropriated money to pay for everything from personal credit card bills to strippers to illegal campaign contributions.

In a desperate attempt to preserve the viability of an inefficient system that rewards few and excludes many, BCS executives have intimated that they may strip the Fiesta of their BCS status. To many, these threats appear to be nothing more than a desperate attempt to stave off Congressional intervention which could force this ultimate good ole boy network to play fair.

For years, BCS officials have claimed that the current system provides college football with its best opportunity to distinguish a true National Champion. Now it's become obvious to most that the system is nothing more than a ploy to funnel money to big, important people with the power to implement rules that fly in the face of all reason.

If college basketball used the same system to determine their National Champion, top-ranked Ohio State and Kansas would be playing on Monday night; instead, we have eight-seeded Butler and third-seeded Connecticut.

As the upstart Butler Bulldogs attempt to shock the world on Monday night by defeating the favored Huskies, fans can only hope that the same sanity that controls NCAA basketball one day makes its way over to the sport with the funny shaped ball.

-      Ryan Lawrence