Columnist Dean Juipe: ‘Title’ game should go FSU’s way

Dean Juipe

Tuesday, Jan. 4, 2000 | 10:10 a.m.

Dean Juipe's column appears Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. His boxing notebook appears Thursday. Reach him at juipe@vegas.com or 259-4084.

This is it: College football's game of the season.

But, funny thing, almost everyone who follows the sport wishes the winner of tonight's Sugar Bowl game in New Orleans between Florida State and Virginia Tech for the "national championship" was obliged to play once more.

Against Nebraska.

With 23 of the bowl season's 24 games having been played, it's Nebraska that has clearly emerged as a team worthy of a little extra consideration. The Cornhuskers looked very strong in their 31-21 Fiesta Bowl win over Tennessee, and would give tonight's winner a legitimate challenge if college football actually had a real playoff system in place to determine its champion.

But it doesn't.

Although some day it will.

Given the current circumstances, fans have to make do with a Florida State vs. Virginia Tech showdown that looks decent on paper yet could be more one-sided than the point spread reflects.

FSU may only be favored by 5 1/2 points (after opening in Las Vegas at 7 1/2), but it has the potential to dominate Tech as it has so many other opponents for the past 13 seasons.

Get this: Florida State has not finished out of the top four in the final Associated Press poll in 12 years, and obviously will finish within the top four again this season. Going backward from 1999, here is FSU's final ranking: 2, 3, 3, 4, 4, 2, 1, 4, 4, 3, 3, 3.

That, folks, is a dynasty.

Critics -- which every program endures, no matter its successes -- point to FSU's lone national championship despite so many close calls, including two losses in title games the past three years. Yet the complaints seem shallow, given the fact that Florida State faithfully contends for top honors in spite of playing a tough schedule in a respectable league.

It wins and it produces a ton of professional players.

It also produces fodder for the police blotter down Tallahasee way, and that grates on the moralists among us. This season was no different than usual, with FSU head coach Bobby Bowden having to deal with five incidents that involved his players and the authorities. One player remains jailed from a summer mishap and another, game-breaking receiver Peter Warrick, didn't win the Heisman Trophy because of a two-game suspension that was, in essence, a penance for shoplifting.

Not to be an apologist for Warrick, but having been one of the 14 Heisman voters who listed him at No. 1, the suspension barely detracted from his season. He's the best player on the country's best team, 'nuff said.

If tonight's game goes according to FSU's plan, he'll play a significant role.

Conversely, should the game follow Tech's outline, it will be freshman quarterback Michael Vick appearing as unstoppable as he did in the regular season. But while the Hokies have Vick, the Seminoles have sufficient diversity beyond Warrick to severely test the nation's second-best team -- whoever that is.

And, Sunday night, it looked like Nebraska.

Maybe Virginia Tech is up to the challenge and maybe it even wins the game. But if Florida State doesn't have to break a serious sweat and wins with any ease, the clamor for a real national championship game will intensify.

As it is, without Nebraska, the "title" game is a misnomer.