BCS rankings don't bother USC

LOS ANGELES -- Southern California coach Pete Carroll has no complaint about his team's BCS ranking, although he would prefer a different system to determine college football's national champion.\nDespite beating Arizona 45-0 last weekend, the Trojans dropped to third in the BCS rankings and, for the moment, out of the national title picture. Ohio State, which defeated Purdue 16-13 in overtime, vaulted over USC and into the second spot behind Oklahoma.\nCarroll said Tuesday his feelings about the BCS rankings haven't changed.\n"This is a system that will come into play at the end of the year. It's really fun and topical for everyone to talk about, and there's some drama with it," he said. "This is the system that we live with. It is what it is. We know all the conversations will come, but we also realize it doesn't have anything to do with what we are doing on the football field.\n"The best thing we can do to give ourselves the best chance is obviously to play real well."\nUSC (9-1) has scored 43 or more points in each of its last five games, all lopsided victories. The Buckeyes (10-1) have won three times without scoring an offensive touchdown, including their victory over Purdue. Five of Ohio State's wins were by a touchdown or less.\nThe Trojans' lone defeat was a 34-31 triple-overtime loss at California on Sept. 27. The Buckeyes lost 17-10 at Wisconsin on Oct. 11.\nUSC is ranked No. 2 in the polls, with Ohio State at No. 4.\nThe Trojans are more concerned with winning the city championship than a national title this week because they play crosstown rival UCLA.\n"We are pumped up about our situation and our chance to do something special this season. It won't happen without a big ball game this Saturday in the Coliseum against UCLA," Carroll said.\nAlthough he was more interested in talking about the upcoming game against the Bruins than the BCS, Carroll did say he would like a different format.\n"No one has ever asked me to change the system, but if they did, I have some viewpoints on that, not the system itself but the format at the end of the season," he said. "If this isn't the right system and there is a better one, then someone should endeavor to figure that out. Right now, this is the system and I'm not complaining about it."\nAsked what he might change, Carroll said he preferred the old setup, like the Rose Bowl's agreement matching the Pac-10 and Big Ten champions each year.\nThen, he said, a championship game could follow.\n"I really love the traditional matchups of the bowl games and I would love to see us playing the Big Ten every year," he explained. "I know I'm old-fashioned, but I love that matchup. I wish that's what happened and then at the end of it, let's play the thing off.\n"The problem with that is that you still have to have some sort of selection process and maybe this is the best process. You can't play forever in a playoff system. You can't have March Madness."\nCarroll said such a plan could be managed in a couple of weeks.\n"I have no idea how to do that, but that's not my job to figure it out," he said. "I would like the best team to win. That's not illogical, but it's not happening right now so I'm not going to worry about it."\nCornerback Will Poole, like his coach, said there's nothing the Trojans can do about the BCS rankings, so they're only worried about beating UCLA.\n"All we can do is to go hard in practice and get ready to play our game," he said. "Anyway, if we had taken care of business against Cal, we wouldn't be in this position"