During halftime of Monday Night Football on Nov. 3, President-elect Barack Obama declared the need for the BCS system to be replaced by a playoff.

Rep. Neil Abercrombie (D-Hawaii) is taking that proclamation a step further, calling for the Department of Justice to look into eliminating the BCS.

“It is clearly a violation of the Sherman Antitrust Law,” Abercrombie said. “It is a clear violation in a sense of restraint of trade.”

Abercrombie has been vocal about his desire to get rid of the BCS for more than a year, but he became more emphatic after Obama’s announcement.

Earlier this week, Abercrombie teamed up with Reps. Lynn Westmoreland (R-Ga.), Jim Matheson (D-Utah) and Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) and wrote a letter to Obama requesting that action be taken in the matter.

In the letter, Abercrombie and his associates stated that “non-BCS schools are at a competitive and financial disadvantage prior to the beginning of the season” and that “the current BCS process is fundamentally unfair.”

Abercrombie pointed out OU’s jump over Texas as the latest reason to scrap the BCS and install a playoff.

“If I was the Texas coach, for example, I would simply be saying, ‘I don’t care who Oklahoma plays, they’re not the champions,’” Abercrombie said. “Suppose Oklahoma goes running all the way through this thing; if I was the Texas coach, I’d say, ‘You can say you’re the champion, but you’re not.’”

Abercrombie said that the BCS is inherently slanted toward the schools in major conferences like the Big 12 or SEC, and consistently slights teams in less-publicized conferences.

“You have to test the competitive benefits against the anti-competitive effects, and you make a balance,” Abercrombie said. “It’s so blindingly clear — in other words, you’d have to be blind not to see — that the anti-competitive effects are so profound on the schools that are not allowed in the BCS equation.”

He particularly noted that Utah and Boise State — both of which are undefeated this season — will not get the chance to compete for a national title.

“How do you say to Boise State that they don’t get to play in a top bowl game?” Abercrombie said. “Oklahoma knows better than anybody. Anybody who played in [the 2006 Fiesta Bowl] — whether on the winning side or the losing side — loved being in that game. They’ll remember it forever, and they’ll remember their part in it. It showed just because you’re from a school that doesn’t necessarily have the big name or the big headlines, it doesn’t mean you can’t play.”

Abercrombie also said that the only way the BCS will change is for the government to step in and do it.

“They will never do it on their own,” he said. “They’ve been forced kicking and screaming by virtue of public outrage at one level or another to begrudgingly allow a non-BCS team in here and there, and even that — especially this year — is absurd and unfair.”

Abercrombie is so confident the BCS is illegal that he said he is certain it would be eliminated if the Department of Justice takes it to court.

“This is no contest,” he said. “There’s no question in my mind it’s illegal. It won’t stand five minutes in any court. In fact, I believe if the Department of Justice takes this to court, any judge will rule on its face that it’s a violation. I don’t even think you have to take it to trial it’s so patently obvious.”

Abercrombie said that if a more open and fair playoff system were established that allowed smaller schools to participate, the wealth of money and talent would be more evenly spread across the nation and create a more even playing field.

However, Abercrombie did not provide an answer for the exact manner in which a new playoff system would be implemented or how many teams would be involved.

“I don’t propose to come up with [a replacement system],” Abercrombie said. “That’s not the issue I’ve raised. The issue I’ve raised is the legal issue. This is clearly restraint of trade, it’s clearly federal in nature and it’s clearly an issue for the Department of Justice to pursue.”