The notion of the Illinois football team qualifying for a BCS bowl, as far as I can tell, was first brought up by Teddy Greenstein of the Chicago Tribune. Seemed pretty silly and far-fetched, I thought.

Then, after another crazy week of college football that saw yet another No. 2 lose, I read this. Suddenly, the team everyone in the blogosphere loves to mock for whatever reasons (Exhibits A, B and C … note: mild language warning on these links) is the hot team people are picking to sneak in this suddenly wide open chase for BCS berths.

Now certainly, with the parity of college football this year, the BCS is a little desperate, and will probably lower their standards faster than the Army has. It’s sort of like when a senior girl, who was on the homecoming court as a junior, asks you to the prom, only she’s let herself go, made a few bad choices and is now pretty much asking anyone who will take her. That’s the BCS right now — the desperate, former it-girl who is now slumming it because she has no choice. But hey, it’s still the BCS and if you don’t think I’m rooting for things to fall Illinois’ way, you’re wrong.

After all, I never went to prom.