Probe of college football's title system suggested

WASHINGTON -- A lawyer for a college athletic conference told Congress on Tuesday that it would be in the public's interest if the government investigated the system that determines college football's No. 1 team.

Barry Brett, who represents the Mountain West Conference, raised the possibility of antitrust violations in the Bowl Championship Series before a Senate Judiciary Committee subcommittee.

In written testimony, Brett called the BCS "a naked restraint imposed by a self-appointed cartel."

He got a favorable reception from Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah, the subcommittee's top Republican. Hatch noted that the Sherman Antitrust Act prohibits contracts, combinations or conspiracies designed to reduce competition.

"I don't believe a plainer description of the BCS exists," he said at the standing-room-only hearing. The BCS "brings to mind the major Supreme Court decisions prohibiting price-fixing and horizontal restrictions on output," added Hatch, who ran the hearing.

Utah, which is in the Mountain West, was bypassed for last year's national championship despite going undefeated in the regular season. The title game pitted Florida against Oklahoma -- each with one loss.

Under the BCS, some conferences get automatic bids to participate, but the Mountain West and others do not. Critics argue that this system reduces competition and distributes money unequally.

But Harvey Perlman, chancellor of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, said the BCS simply recognizes that the public wants to watch powerhouse college football teams such as his. Perlman, the new chairman of the BCS Presidential Oversight Committee, said the five conferences that don't get automatic bids do not add any revenue to the BCS.

At one point, Perlman prefaced a comment by saying he didn't want to sound disrespectful to Utah.

"And you don't want to be in this room," Hatch quipped to laugher.

Perlman conceded that some teams, because of factors such as history or reputation, have a better chance to play in the national championship than others.

"The problem is that we don't all play each other, and there's no conceivable way" for that to happen, he said.