History shows it's not safe to be ranked ahead of USC

                    

	Chauncey Washington's three touchdown runs against Oregon led the Trojans to a win this past Saturday -- and helped them vault to No. 3 in the BCS rankings. Stephen Dunn/Getty Images
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The season is the playoff.

That's the answer given by most purists to every proposed playoff system in college football. Implementing any kind of four, eight or 16-team playoff would, in their eyes, kill off the "Game of the Year" atmosphere that surrounds the sport week in and week out from early September through late November. It's why a Sept. 9 matchup between Texas and Ohio State is just as important to the national championship picture as Saturday's game between Ohio State and Michigan.

I've always had a problem with this argument. Not because it's necessarily wrong, but because it's certainly not always right. The basis of "the season is the playoff "mantra is that if you win all your games you should be in position to play for the national championship at season's end. If you lose a game, you're all but done (depending on when and to whom you lose and how the other teams in front of you fare.) The theory, however, is hit or miss. There are some years when the teams that began the season ranked Nos. 1 and 2 win out, giving no chance to teams below them that may go undefeated (see Auburn and Utah two years ago), and then there are some years when teams that are unbeaten are ranked below teams with one loss because they began the season ranked so low (see Rutgers and Boise State this season). Something always seems to go wrong.

The one person who seems to make things go right for his team is Pete Carroll. Two weeks ago, USC was left for dead after losing to unranked Oregon State, 33-31, dropping the Trojans from No. 3 to No. 9 in the polls. While the loss was certainly surprising, USC's leap back up to the No. 3 spot in the BCS standings within 14 days shouldn't be shocking to those who have followed the Trojans in recent years. It's almost as if Carroll has voodoo dolls for each team sitting in front of him in the polls and after he suffers a loss, poking each one off week by week.

Carroll has often compared this year's team to the 2003 squad -- breaking in a new backfield that had lost the reigning Heisman Trophy winner and dealing with loss of more than 10 starters from the previous season -- and judging from the Trojans' recent surge in the BCS standings, the similarities don't stop with the players on the field. Consider this: When USC lost to unranked Cal on Sept. 27, 2003, the Trojans were ranked No. 3 in the polls and subsequently dropped to No. 10 behind seven undefeated teams. Within two weeks of the Trojans' loss to Cal, six teams above them lost, returning USC right back to where it was in the polls. During the course of the next nine weeks after the Trojans' loss, every team above them lost at least once, giving USC the No. 1 ranking by season's end.