Having a rabid Mountaineer fan for a father makes it dangerous for me to say this, but I'm almost glad West Virginia lost the Sugar Bowl. Otherwise I would have spent the last week of my vacation listening to Dad, a WVU grad, argue that his team should be national champs.

Fortunately Florida State won, the 'Eers choked and only the people in South Bend felt disappointed -- and I enjoyed watching them get the shaft.

But let's face it. Like every sportswriter and commentator in the country was saying in the week leading up to New Year's, it's time for a national championship game. If head-to-head competition during the regular season doesn't matter, maybe a hyped-up, advertising revenue-producing spectacular will.

It's impossible for voters --whether they be coaches, sportswriters, NCAA officials or a bunch of guys in the parking lot outside the stadium -- to figure out who the best team is without having them play each other. Sometimes it doesn't even matter when they do play each other.

I know how hard it is to do a football poll because I spent Fall Semester doing one myself. The Daily Collegian ran its own picks along with the Associated Press poll, and I was one of 27 lucky Collegian staffers who got to vote.

It may seem pretty simple to do a poll, but it isn't. True, my major qualifications were that I watch SportsCenter and read the sports section regularly, but I don't think the professional sportswriters who do the AP poll could have much more going for them. Their major qualification is that they write the stuff that I read regularly.

Every Sunday between meetings, editing copy and trying to put out Monday's paper, I sat down in the office with my the game results and tried to figure out how to rank the teams, usually with a certain sports editor hovering around me saying, "Did you do your poll yet?"

It's easy to criticize and argue about a poll after the results are out. It's a little bit more difficult to do it yourself. I can't imagine what it would be like if the whole country was counting on me to help choose the No. 1 team in the nation.

The only people who can decide the national championship are the players. The teams need to compete with each other. Until they do, it will all be speculation and guessing.

There are always arguments against a national championship game, like that we'll lose the significance of the bowl games. But do we really need eight bowl games on New Year's Day? Besides the fact that it's not possible to watch them all, even with a good clicker, I got pretty tired of it by the time Florida State finally pulled off a win.

Truthfully, the only significant games are the ones your team and the potential champions play. Did anybody really care about the Carquest Bowl? A tournament makes every game significant.

And nothing makes me sicker than the NCAA bringing up academics as a reason for nixing a championship. Do NCAA officials worry about midterms during March Madness? I think not.

So the top few teams in the country play a few more games. Most of them sit idle a month waiting for the bowl games anyway. Give them a break for finals, then get them playing again.

The worst problem may be how to pick the teams in the tournament, but it isn't insurmountable. Start with 16 teams, including all the conference champions and a few wild cards chosen by voting. It isn't a perfect solution, but out of those 16 teams, I guarantee one of them is the national champion.

Then let them play it out. If the bowls want to stick around, have the USF&G Insurance Sugar Semifinal, and I bet the NCAA will make enough money off the championship game to survive.

In the end, everyone would be happy. West Virginia would have its shot, Notre Dame would lose and Florida State would still end up No. 1. They just would have proven it this time.