SAN DIEGO — The Ducks can’t win. They can lose but they can’t win.

So, for a moment, put yourself in their position.

You have to win.

Confused? Don’t be.

Oregon is only the latest example of what’s wrong with the Bowl Championship Series. Not so much how the BCS decides its national champion, although Oregon likely has something to say about that, too (back in 2001, when everybody was pretty sure Nebraska would be clobbered by Miami in the national championship game at the Rose bowl, it was the Ducks — along with Colorado — on the outside looking in), but how the remaining BCS roster gets filled.

There are four BCS bowls: Rose, Sugar, Orange, Fiesta.

So the top eight teams in the nation should get the bids, right? Wrong.

Conference champions from the Big 10, Big 12, SEC, ACC, Big East and Pac-10 receive automatic bids. That leaves two at-large teams hoping for the best and the Fiesta Bowl doled out its two spots to No. 4 Ohio State and No. 5 Notre Dame.

Nothing wrong with that, but Oregon, No. 6, still got squeezed.

The Buckeyes and Irish are both 9-2. The Ducks are 10-1.

“Did our team feel we should be in a BCS bowl? Absolutely,” Oregon coach Mike Bellotti said. “If you’re the fifth-ranked [in the coaches poll] team in the nation, then probably that should work, but it didn’t.”

So the Ducks can’t win.

They’re only loss was to Southern Cal. It wasn’t close, but still.

And now they have to play Oklahoma?

Oklahoma?