Taylor Swift's big night too big and Darius Rucker gets it because he gets it

There was no doubt Taylor Swift was going to win the Country Music Academy's Entertainer of the Year award Wednesday night.

She's had as big of a year, if not bigger, than any artist in any genre. She sold out arenas, set album sale records for the century, played host to Saturday Night Live, became the first country artist to win a VMA award from MTV and much more in the past year. She has singly-handily brought country music to a new audience. It would have been nearly impossible for the academy to overlook her accomplishments and deny her its biggest award.

However, the academy went too far in naming her female vocalist of the year. That award should go to the best vocalist, based purely on vocals and song selection. Reba, Martina McBride and especially Carrie Underwood, who sounded way better singing about swine flu than Swift ever could with the work of Milli Vanilli's producers, are all better vocalist than Swift.

She sings and writes songs that are catchy, that almost everyone can relate to because they were dumped once in eight grade and puts on an incredible live show. She's highly entertaining, a pure vocalist she is not.

Swift's big night and her sweep of four awards dominated headlines Thursday but Swift becoming the youngest to win the entertainer of the year award wasn't the only significant win of the night.

Lady Antebellum's win over Rascal Flatts for best group was just as big of a win as the first time Sugarland beat Brooks and Dunn for duo of the year. Rascal Flatts will no longer just be penciled into the winner column at the start of every show. Lady A will challenge them for the next few years and they have the talent, song writing abilities and vocal harmonies to have competed with the Dixie Chicks when that trio was at their peak. However, Lady Antebellum doesn't have Jennifer Nettles at the helm, so this award should be a two-horse race for as long as both continue to put out music. Lady A also picked up the award for single of the year with "I run to you," which, combined with their best new artist award last year, gives the group three awards in two years.

In any other year, the Zac Brown Band would have won the best new artist award, but the award went to Darius Rucker. His win resembled MLB's Ichiro's Rookie of the Year award in 2001. Just as Ichiro was no stranger to baseball that year, Hootie and the Blowfish's front man is no stranger to the music industry.

Rucker thanked fans for accepting his music and maybe even sounded surprised to add the hardware to his three straight number one singles. But he shouldn't be too surprised: he wanted to make a country album and went about it the right way and it has paid off.

Rucker asked his band to make a country album with him and went solo when they declined. He's obviously not the first artist to try to seek crossover success in country music, but he's the first to do so with such success in a long time. His success is due to the fact he made not only a good album, but an actual country album.

CD sales are declining across the industry, however, country music is the only genera where sales continue to rise. While Swift has played a large part in this as of late, the main reason for this is country music fans are loyal to their favorite artists and have continued to keep purchasing their albums in stores. It's not hard to see why artists want to crossover to country music and try to grab a piece of the sales action.

However, when artists such Jessica Simpson have made country CDs, they have produced the exact same records they have always put out but sold them on the country racks in stores. Country music fans aren't stupid. They know just because it is sold in the country section doesn't make it a country album.

Rucker, a lifelong country fan, knew what it took to make a true country album and went to work doing so. His country debut CD, Learn to Live, is a country album and sounds a lot different than anything he produced as a member of Hootie and the Blowfish. His efforts were rightfully recognized Wednesday night.

While Rucker was well deserving of the award, it's unfortunate the talented Zac Brown Band, who have "whatever it is," didn't win as they will be forced to compete with Rascal Flatts and Lady A for the foreseeable future. They will almost certainly be nominated for the group award for the next five years even if they never release another single because the category is that weak, but it could be a very long time, if ever, before they hear their names called to accept a trophy.

Sugarland won best duo for the third straight time, beating the sentimental pick Brooks and Dunn after they made their last appearance on the show together. But fans shouldn't be surprised to see one of them back on future award shows. Ronnie has Dunn more than has enough vocal power to compete for the best male vocalist award and just might decide to chose to do so.