Normally I don’t care to comment on the national sports scene, but tomorrow’s BCS Bowl Championship game pitting Oklahoma and Florida has my piqued my interest. I want to be able to say I’ve seen a national champion in person.

Some of you may have read my account of the Washington Huskies-Sooners “game” from earlier this college football season (http://search.sequimgazette.com/sports/article.exm/2008-09-17_a_husky_debacle,_up_close_and_personal).

I call it a game with parentheses because it felt much more like a scrimmage. Oklahoma moved the ball with such deft precision and ease that it wouldn’t have surprise me if it turned out to be a starters-versus-scout team, non-contact run-through before a bowl game.

Actually, the scout team would have done better.

Like a lot of Big-12 school rosters, the Oklahoma players look huge up close. But I was impressed with their speed and agility, particularly Sam Bradford, now the Heisman Trophy award winner. On that cool September afternoon, Bradford was the coolest cat in the stadium, picking apart UW to the tune of 18-of-21 passing for 304 yards and five touchdowns — in three quarters.

As good as they are, Oklahoma could easily have topped 60- or 70-point plateaus that night. Instead they settled for a 55-14 win, putting two running backs over the 100-yard plateau. Washington did rack up more than 300 yards on OU but only scored when it was already 41-0, and only because Jake Locker is a miracle-worker. He threw for 154 yards and led the team with 44 rushing yards, including a 15-yard score.

Will it be enough to beat Tim Tebow, the former Heisman winner, and Florida’s Gators? The only ding on Florida’s schedule was a one-point home loss to Ole’ Miss. Since then they have crushed everybody — and I mean crushed — almost everyone in their path, including a 49-10 spanking of No. 6 Georgia in Georgia, a 45-15 win at No. 20 Florida State, a 51-21 win against No. 4 LSU, a 63-5 win against a pretty decent Kentucky team. Finally, they topped Alabama, then the No. 1 team in the country, 31-20 on Dec. 6. Thank you, SEC schedule-makers.

The Sooners? Their only black mark, a 45-35 loss to Texas, a team some say — and they may be right here — should be in the national championship against Florida. OU has wins against No. 24 TCU (35-10), No. 12 Oklahoma State (61-41), No. 20 Missouri (62-21), a 62-28 win against then-unranked Nebraska and, most impressively, a 65-21 win against Texas Tech… the team that handed Texas their only loss of 2008.

Bradford is a stud and so is Tebow. They’ll both be great, and it’ll be a shoot-out. The only question: which defense will break first? Oklahoma, despite a win against the Huskies, has the nation’s No. 1 strength of schedule as ranked by CBSSSports.com while Florida has the No. 3 Strength of Schedule. Oklahoma gave up 23.8 points per game while Florida gave up just 12.8 ppg.

Who wins? If I were a betting man, I’d say Florida. But I’m not, so I’m taking Bradford and the Sooners by 4.

I plan on missing much of it, however. Got to cover the much-anticipated Sequim-Port Angeles wrestling match tomorrow night.