#21 Northern Illinois (12-1, 8-0 MAC) vs #17 Kent State (11-2, 8-0 MAC): Northern Illinois Wins MAC Title 44-37
Northern Illinois might have had double the total yards that Kent State had (524 vs 260) thanks in part to their rushing game comprised of Jordan Lynch and Akeem Daniels, who rushed for 160 yds and 128 yds, respectively, BUT it took two overtimes and just one touchdown to beat the Golden Flashes.
And with that the MAC’s chances to have a team granted an automatic BCS berth basically disappeared. Northern Illinois will improve in the standing, but not higher than the 17th ranked team they beat. And unfortunately to get that automatic berth, they would need to finish in the top 16 of the final BCS Standings (assuming such ranking is higher than that of a champion of a conference that has an annual automatic berth).
