Today brings the release of the season’s first Bowl Championship Series standings, and with it, the typical fretting about which undefeated team stands to be left out of the championship game. Invariably, the argument turns to questions of why there is no playoff system to determine a true champion. So perhaps it’s fitting that Saturday delivered a stunning bill of college football, one that served as a reminder of the beauty of the sport at its best, and as a warning about what could be lost in the singular pursuit of a satisfactory conclusion to the season.

First, some perspective on Saturday’s events. The easy thing is to focus on where USC’s last-second win over Notre Dame will rank among the great games of all time (the answer – right near the top, especially if the Trojans go on to claim another national championship). But perspective can be achieved only by considering some of the day’s other results. Wisconsin recovered a blocked punt in the end zone with 30 seconds to play to beat Minnesota, rescuing the Badgers’ hopes for a Big Ten title. In any other week, that game would be office water-cooler material until Friday, but it was no better than the day’s third-best finish, behind USC’s win and Michigan’s last-second (literally) heartbreaker over Penn State.

Consider Saturday’s results in total. Eight of nine remaining undefeated teams were in action – and idle Virginia Tech was no doubt thankful for the timing of its bye week after seeing what befell some of its undefeated colleagues. Of the eight, five had games decided in the final minute or in overtime, with two – Penn State and Florida State – losing their perfect seasons.

In what other week would UCLA’s overtime victory over Washington State, in which the Bruins twice overcame 21-point deficits on the road, barely get mentioned on the late SportsCenter? What about LSU’s emotional 24-17 squeaker over Florida in the SEC? Or West Virginia’s 46-44 triple-overtime thriller over Louisville for control of the Big East?

Such was the bedlam on a day when Penn State had its renaissance season rudely interrupted by a last-play, walk off touchdown pass by Michigan’s Chad Henne, which provided the last of three lead changes in the final minutes.

Then there was Florida State. The Seminoles’ 26-21 loss to Virginia came on the 10th anniversary of their first ever ACC loss, also to the Cavaliers in Charlottesville, and was sealed by an interception in the final minute. Meanwhile, Boston College’s come-from-behind 35-30 victory over Wake Forest wrested control of the ACC from the Seminoles.

Each of those games was exceptional in its own right, but still paled in comparison to USC-Notre Dame, which is only likely to grow in stature as time passes. The game featured two of the nation’s most storied programs, renewing one of the sport’s greatest rivalries, on an absolutely stunning fall afternoon in one of college football’s cathedrals, with last minute heroics from the once, and perhaps future, Heisman Trophy winners.

Ultimately, it was Trojan horse Matt Leinart, with his audible call on 4thand-9 and his surprise sneak to win the game that kept USC’s hopes for a second-straight BCS and third-straight AP national title alive.

Ah yes, the BCS. If there’s anything that can throw a damper on the weekend, it’s those three letters. If days like Saturday are the silver linings of college football, the BCS is the dark cloud. With seven major-conference unbeatens remaining, and only three possible games between them (Texas Tech-Texas this Saturday, and UCLA-USC and a potential SEC title game between Alabama and Georgia on December 3), we could be headed for another controversial bowl season.

BCS officials have remained relentlessly positive in attempting to tweak their system to react to each perceived injustice of past seasons. But BCS coordinator Kevin Wieberg all but admitted this week that trouble could again be brewing, telling the New Orleans Times-Picayune, “If we have another year with three major teams unbeaten and one left out of the championship game or some additional situation, that could cause folks to at least think about it.”

“It” in this case means not a full-blown playoff, but a single championship game, to be played the week after the BCS bowls – Fiesta, Orange, Sugar,and Rose – with the participants chosen from among the winners of those four games. The BCS effectively put the infrastructure for such a game in place last year when it introduced the “double-hosting” model, which goes into effect next season.

Starting in January of 2007, there will be a fifth BCS bowl, to be played one week later at the site of one of the four traditional BCS games. For now, that fifth game will simply increase the number of participating teams in the BCS from eight to 10, but it doesn’t take a great leap of imagination to see where the “double-hosting” model could become a “plus-one” model, with two BCS bowl winners facing off for the undisputed national title.

Even that system won’t solve all the problems. There will still be controversy over the BCS bowl matchups and which of the four winners make the final game.

Only a fairly inclusive playoff, of perhaps 16 teams, would settle all the arguments. There would still be controversy over which team is no.17,but that wouldn’t cause the same fury as the current “who’s no. 3” or a potential “who’s no. 5” in a more-limited playoff.

A 16-team playoff would require four weeks of games, and would still have to be shoe-horned into the bowl season. There are too many issues of economics and academics (in that order) that must be solved for it to occur any time soon.

While such a system would provide college football with a no-argument national champion, such a singular goal has a hidden cost. Those clamoring loudest for a playoff often fail to realize that it could render a historic day like Saturday meaningless – or at least far less dramatic. Don’t think so? Ask yourself: Would Leinart have been weeping with joy and exhaustion on the sidelines in South Bend if he had a playoff to look forward to come season’s end?

As it stands, we’ll be talking about USC-Notre Dame 50 years from now, and in a sport that sells itself on tradition, that’s a heavy price to pay for a controversy-free finish.

Mr. Levine is a writer for the Web site www.FootballOutsiders.com.