With its one-point win over Pitt Friday night, West Virginia stayed alive in the Big East BCS chase. Here's what WVU needs to earn a BCS berth. Special thanks goes to the Charleston Daily Mail, which helped me in a couple spots below when I got confused. It's that kind of BCS chase.
WVU is currently 4-2 in the Big East. Louisville beat South Florida on Friday and moved to 5-2 in the process. That's trouble for the Mountaineers, since Louisville beat West Virginia on November 5. But WVU's hopes are still alive thanks to Cincinnati. If the Bearcats, who are 3-2, win their final two regular-season games against Syracuse and Connecticut, and WVU wins its final game against South Florida, then Louisville, WVU and Cincinnati would all finish conference play with the same record. The three teams are all 1-1 against one another, so the team that is highest in the BCS standings would head to a BCS bowl. That's likely to be WVU. If Cincinnati fails to win out, or if WVU fails to win its final game, the Mountaineers won't be playing in a BCS bowl, and probably would head to the Belk Bowl.
Rutgers is 4-2 in the Big East and has one game remaining, against UConn. If Rutgers wins that game and WVU and Cincinnati both win out, the BCS berth would go to either WVU or Louisville, depending on who is higher in the BCS standings. Again, that would likely be WVU.
We'll have more on this once Cincinnati and Rutgers play on Saturday. West Virginia fans will want to root hard for the Bearcats.