photo by RMTips21, Creative Commons

Last night the University of Florida Gators claimed the title of BCS Champions against the University of Oklahoma Sooners. Gators football superstar Tim Tebow threw for 231 yards and ran for 110 yards. Although I’m not quite the Gator fan some of my fellow TakePart writers are, I have to admin that Tebow and fellow Florida star Percy Harvin (who was allgedly injured) put on a steady performance, even after a slack first half where Tebow threw more interceptions in 30 miuntes than he had all year.

There’s lots of noise today about the Gators and the BCS system - for example whether or not NCAA college football should have a playoff system or stick with the bowl games, the controversy over Tebow’s John 3:16 eye black, or the ridiculous amount of speculation about Tim Tebow’s girlfriend, What would I rather make noise about? The college football season that was and the benefits of big football and athletic programs as a whole. Let’s get to it, shall we?

• NCAA Sports raise a lot of money for their respective schools, with football leading the way in terms of revenue. It can seem strange to endorse an amateur football team raising over $38m in profit for a single school. However, the revenue that big sports brings in supports athletic programs and sports that, while less profitable, are very important to the experience and culture of universities. Furthermore, the money supports Title IX programs.
• The NCAA’s 400,000 student athletes received over $1.5b in scholarships last year. Making higher education more accesible is something we should all support.
• Tim Tebow has an orphanage. In the Philippines. He also has a Heisman trophy and two BCS Championships. Who cares how you feel about his squeaky clean demeanor and oustpoken faith, what did you do today?
• The bowl season was great - all of the BCS games were within two touchdowns (way better than the past), even if some where very dominant wins (see USC/Penn State). There were surprises from teams that had been off people’s radar (Utah/Alabama & Ole Miss/Georgia Tech). There were lots of exciting non-BCS bowl games (Kentucky/Eastern Carolina).
• My team had a winning record and crushed their opponent in their bowl game. This pleases me.
• College football makes us happy. It gets us out with our families and friends tailgating, it entertains us on Saturdays, and it reminds us of our college days.

So here’s a great college football season. See you next year… nah, we’re lying, we’ll see you on draft day when we get to talk about all of this again. Also - check here for the AP Poll final football rankings of 2009.

Feel the love.