Hypothetical 2005 NCAA D1 football playoffs

[gmo]

Want a playoff in D1 football? Tell me how it would be set up for this season if you had your way.

This year we have USC, UT, PSU, WV, FSU, UGA in the BCS, with OSU going to be guaranteed an at-large spot and ND certainly getting the other at-large bid. Matchups appear set for PSU/FSU in the Orange, UGA/WV in the Sugar, ND/OSU in the Fiesta, and of course the title game of USC/UT in the Rose.

Though the BCS is not my favorite thing, I am far from in favor of moving to a playoff in D1 college football. For me the sport does not need to crown a champion through a playoff to be legitimate, and any playoff system will be as arbitrary as the current one for picking out which team to say is the best.

I do not mind rehashing all that argument, but my particular aim here is to find out some of the opinions on how advocates feel the playoff system should be set and using this year to fill in the slots and show an actual full scenario.

List off your teams that you think should be involved and their seeding order or whatever scheme you would have the playoff system follow.

[JDOldSchool]

I don't like a playoff system either because it would be either too big (16 teams) or the wrong teams would get in (like ND this year).

[gmo]

Originally Posted by JDOldSchool

I don't like a playoff system either because it would be either too big (16 teams) or the wrong teams would get in (like ND this year).

Heh, since you mention it, criticism like that of various ideas people would post is not being discouraged by me.

Surely some people will still have the courage to put up their ideas even knowing they will likely get responses questioning how well their system would work in another season or how the selection criteria are hardly less arbitrary than the BCS is now in its getting a top two for a championship game!

[Skipaway]

One game playoff system: UT vs. USC.

[JDOldSchool]

Originally Posted by Skipaway

One game playoff system: UT vs. USC.

Works for me.

[Erik W.]

Originally Posted by Skipaway

One game playoff system: UT vs. USC.

That certainly works this year. No one should have any complaints about that.

But what about last year when there were 3 undefeateds? And that wasn't the first time, nor the last. Or any year with one or no undefeateds and lots of one-loss teams. Or... you get the idea.

I don't want a long playoff. But two or three rounds would certainly be acceptable and doable. Hell, they call it the Bowl Championship Series. Why not make it just that?

[Skipaway]

Originally Posted by Azamien

That certainly works this year. No one should have any complaints about that.

But what about last year when there were 3 undefeateds? And that wasn't the first time, nor the last. Or any year with one or no undefeateds and lots of one-loss teams. Or... you get the idea.

I don't want a long playoff. But two or three rounds would certainly be acceptable and doable. Hell, they call it the Bowl Championship Series. Why not make it just that?

So what if there were three undefeated teams? We got a system to determine which two would be in the playoffs, just like all other playoff systems got their own systems when you got ties. You don't see NFL playing extra rounds, or NCAA basketball beating themselves worrying if sometimes it should be 69 teams, and sometimes 62.

[Erik W.]

Originally Posted by Skipaway

So what if there were three undefeated teams? We got a system to determine which two would be in the playoffs, just like all other playoff systems got their own systems when you got ties. You don't see NFL playing extra rounds, or NCAA basketball beating themselves worrying if sometimes it should be 69 teams, and sometimes 62.

The NFL doesn't need extra rounds because they have a clear, concise method of determining playoff participants that doesn't include any human voting. And NCAA basketball has a playoff system, if you haven't noticed. In order to defend the lack of a playoff, you keep bringing up leagues that have playoffs. Ironic, huh?

[Raderick]

The championship game is ok, but what about the Orange Bowl; Florida St. vs Penn State? For the Sugar Bowl, we have West Virginia and Georgia? Oregon is most likely going to get snubbed over Ohio St. because they're on the west coast.

While not as prolific as previous seasons, the BCS screws up once again.

If we were to keep the BCS, I'd rather have the teams ranked 1-8 play in the games. You'll have 1-2 fight in whatever bowl is designated the championship game, 3-8, 4-7 and 5-6 playing each other, regardless of conference. I'd also like to see 5 bowls alternate though the four slots. Good cantidates for that 5th bowl could be the Liberty Bowl, Holiday Bowl, or the Insight Bowl

[Dagrims]

Originally Posted by JDOldSchool

or the wrong teams would get in (like ND this year).

Huh? I'm far from a Notre Dame football fan, but this is one year they certainly deserve to be named among the 16 best teams in the country.

[Cooleyvol]

Originally Posted by Raderick

I'd also like to see 5 bowls alternate though the four slots. Good cantidates for that 5th bowl could be the Liberty Bowl, Holiday Bowl, or the Insight Bowl

You're kidding, right? Liberty, Holiday, or Insight.com Bowls? what about the Citrus or Cotton? Ever hear of those bowl games?

As for the playoff, my system would be either 8 or 16 teams, most likely 8. It would use the higher tier bowls, rotated, as its playing sites and would not kill the lesser bowl games.

It would work (it does in the other divisions of college football) and shouldn't cost class time to a great degree.

How to pick the teams? That I'm not sure of, but the 6 conference champions with at large invites somehow would have to be in there.

There'll always be debate, even with a system such as this as long as you have the Notre Dames getting bids over teams more deserving, such as Oregon merely b/c of prestige and geographical placement in the country.

Oregon got the BCS poke in the arse this year. Next year, it'll be someone else.

[Raderick]

Originally Posted by Cooleyvol

You're kidding, right? Liberty, Holiday, or Insight.com Bowls? what about the Citrus or Cotton? Ever hear of those bowl games?

As for the playoff, my system would be either 8 or 16 teams, most likely 8. It would use the higher tier bowls, rotated, as its playing sites and would not kill the lesser bowl games.

It would work (it does in the other divisions of college football) and shouldn't cost class time to a great degree.

How to pick the teams? That I'm not sure of, but the 6 conference champions with at large invites somehow would have to be in there.

There'll always be debate, even with a system such as this as long as you have the Notre Dames getting bids over teams more deserving, such as Oregon merely b/c of prestige and geographical placement in the country.

Oregon got the BCS poke in the arse this year. Next year, it'll be someone else.

I'm just naming off bowl names from the top of my head, mailman . By the way, the Holiday Bowl usually has some of the best match-ups, and usually has the best ratings of all of the non-BCS games.

Better yet, lets do the 16 team format. The 11 teams who won their conferences, and then 5 at-large bids. If Notre Dame is good enough, they would be considered the 12th team (as they are an independant team). Then seed those teams by their ranking in the AP rankings. Don't they rank all of the D-1a teams, but only report the top 25?

[Cooleyvol]

Why should ND get to be the 12th team 'if they're good enough'?

Being an independent, they should fight for one of the 5 at large spots just like everyone else, in your scenario.

I really hate the treatment Notre Dame receives from the media/NCAA merely b/c of being 'Notre Dame'. Ask Oregon's fans about it..............

[Faroo6]

Originally Posted by Raderick

The championship game is ok, but what about the Orange Bowl; Florida St. vs Penn State? For the Sugar Bowl, we have West Virginia and Georgia? Oregon is most likely going to get snubbed over Ohio St. because they're on the west coast.

While not as prolific as previous seasons, the BCS screws up once again.

If we were to keep the BCS, I'd rather have the teams ranked 1-8 play in the games. You'll have 1-2 fight in whatever bowl is designated the championship game, 3-8, 4-7 and 5-6 playing each other, regardless of conference. I'd also like to see 5 bowls alternate though the four slots. Good cantidates for that 5th bowl could be the Liberty Bowl, Holiday Bowl, or the Insight Bowl

Or 1-4, 2-3, 5-6, 7-8 and the top 2 teams after the BCS play in a game the next week. This way if for some reason you have 4 undefeated going in you only have two coming out and they can play for the National Championship.

Of course this year I'm totally happy with the Championship Game.

[rangers85]

If I were to start a playoff, it would be the 11 conference champs and 5 at large bids with the 5 at larges being the 5 highest ranked teams in the BCS rankings not receiving an at large bid. Thus for this year you'd have as auto-bids:

ACC-Florida St
Big East-West Virginia
Big 10-Penn St
Big 12-Texas
CUSA-Tulsa
MAC-Akron
MWC-TCU
Pac 10-USC
SEC-Georgia
Sun Belt-Arkansas St
WAC-Boise St

Then the 5 at large bids would go to (Using the Nov 28 rankings since none released yet for today):
1-LSU
2-VTech
3-Ohio St
4-Oregon
5-Notre Dame
(Most likely though, Miami and Auburn end up taking LSU and VTech's spots due to their losses yesterday dropping them below those 2 in all probability)

The seeds then are distributed in the order of the BCS rankings, thus the matchups would be

(1) USC v (16) Arkansas St
(2) Texas v (15) Akron
(3) Penn St v (14) Tulsa
(4) LSU v (13) Florida St
(5) VTech v (12) Boise St
(6) Ohio St v (11) TCU
(7) Oregon v (10) Georgia
(8) Notre Dame v (9) West Virginia

For #12-#16 teams were seeded in order of best overall record as they do not appear on the BCS rankings.

Under any system you're going to have debate about who should be included no matter what. But under this scenario you're squabbling over 2 loss teams pretty well every year on which one should get in rather than squabbling over which 0 or 1 loss teams should have a shot at the national championship game. For this scenario to take place, I'd suggest the first round of games to be played on the higher seed's home campus. This would cut down on expecting alumni to travel 4 straight weeks for bowl games which the majority of your alumni wouldn't. Especially for alumni of teams like USC to face Arkansas St and the like. This would also give the advantage to the higher seed moreso since most likely these will be the teams that are seeded in the Top 8 of the BCS rankings. This also would allow for upsets to occur.

The second round could then be played at say the Fiesta, Cotton, Holiday, and Peach Bowls. You could replace Holiday and Peach with any combination. Highest seed plays lowest seed in the Fiesta, #2 vs #7 in the Cotton, and the 3/6 and 4/5 matchups in the other two bowls.

Winners from these games would go onto the semis which this year would be played at the Orange and Sugar bowls. With the eventual winners meeting to play in the Rose Bowl for the championship.

Under this scenario you'll use 7 of your most prestigious bowls in the playoffs, while the lesser bowls could survive by giving the teams left out of the playoffs a place to extend their seasons.

For all intents and purposes you could have the first round of games the week following championship weekend, so Dec 10 this year, second round Dec 17, Semi-Finals Dec 24, and the Rose Bowl could be played New Years day.

You could keep the season at 11 games, or even drop it down to 10 in order to give finals week off to the players. The teams playing for the championship would play 15 games under the current system, 8 teams with 12, 4 teams with 13, and 2 teams with 14.

You've already got a decent amount of teams that are playing 13 games this year, so it's not that much of an extra toil.

[Dagrims]

Why would giving playoff spots to Akron, Arkansas State and Tulsa be a better system than taking the top 16 teams via the BCS rankings? Who do you think would want to see that on television or live?

[Jeremy Weimer]

Originally Posted by Dagrims

Why would giving playoff spots to Akron, Arkansas State and Tulsa be a better system than taking the top 16 teams via the BCS rankings? Who do you think would want to see that on television or live?

Me!

Sorry Dagrims. Just had to spoil your fun.

[rangers85]

Also, if the above system was used last year (Number in parenthesis is BCS rank):

ACC-VTech (#8)
Big East-Pittsburgh (#21)
Big 10-Michigan (#13)
Big 12-Oklahoma (#2)
CUSA-Louisville (#10)
MAC-Toledo (N/A)
MWC-Utah (#6)
Pac 10-USC (#1)
SEC-Auburn (#3)
Sun Belt-North Texas (N/A)
WAC-Boise St (#9)
At Large 1-Cal (#4)
At Large 2-Georgia (#7)
At Large 3-LSU (#11)
At Large 4-Iowa (#12)
At Large 5-Miami (#14)

Thus pairings would look like:
(1) USC v (16) North Texas
(2) Oklahoma v (15) Toledo
(3) Auburn v (14) Pittsburgh
(4) Texas v (13) Michigan
(5) Cal v (12) Iowa
(6) Utah v (11) LSU
(7) Georgia v (10) Louisville
(8) VTech v (9) Boise St

The last team that would have missed out on an at large bid would be #14 Miami who was 8-3 and a #15 Tenn who was 9-3 in favor of #12 Iowa who was 9-2. For 2004, the only 2 or less loss teams that would have been left out would be Wisconsin (#17) and Navy (N/A).

[jaxmagicman]

Originally Posted by Dagrims

Why would giving playoff spots to Akron, Arkansas State and Tulsa be a better system than taking the top 16 teams via the BCS rankings? Who do you think would want to see that on television or live?

I would too, because if UCF just had a better showing in the Championship game they could have made it. It makes it better because it keeps more fans interested.

[rangers85]

Originally Posted by Dagrims

Why would giving playoff spots to Akron, Arkansas State and Tulsa be a better system than taking the top 16 teams via the BCS rankings? Who do you think would want to see that on television or live?

It's all about access. Who's to say they may not pull off a miracle run. Would you be in favor of leaving out a division champion from the playoffs in baseball because another team being left out in another division had a better record? They won their conference, thus, should be rewarded with a spot in the playoffs. March Madness also gives a guaranteed birth in the tournament to the winner of each conference no matter how good or bad the conference.