The trouble with these huge conferences is that a good but not great team might wind up not playing a conference foe having a good year except for one or two games- and that’s what happened to Indiana. They’re a good team, but not at Ohio State’s level. They just happened to have an extraordinarily favorable conference schedule.
ESPN Gameday yesterday acted like they would so much have preferred to cover the Florida-Mississippi (I refuse to use the silly nickname for Mississippi) game than the OSU-IU game they were actually at. And what’s with McAfee offering a million dollars for the coach to hit the crossbar with a pass? Did he have the network’s permission to make such an offer? I can’t imagine The Mouse being okay with him just tossing out a million bucks for the heck of it.
Yippee. Alabama has three losses. I doubt that will impact their God-given right to make the playoff every year but if they do it will show what a farce the committee is.
Indeed, an eight-game schedule for a 16-team conference is going to result in high variance strengths of schedules. It will take some creative thinking (with good math skills) to come up with logical solutions that even partially address the problem. And logic and creativity usually takes a back seat to money in college football.
As an avid observer, I am enjoying the chaos and parity of this season.
The answer seems simple to me - have 4 divisions per conference, and get the NCAA to pass legislation to allow a conference to have a 2-round conference championship tournament.
12 regular season games
2 Conference champion games
3 playoff games
17 games total. More opportunity for serious injuries that could impact their lives. Not all those kids are making hundreds of thousands on NIL. Some are no name lineman etc.
A Meaningless game in the Rose Bowl last night, but I liked it!
Bruins get a 45 yard (in theory) penalty, and have to kick off from their own 5 yard line! It would be Comedy Gold, but Troy failed to capitalize on it.
It’s possible to play 4 playoff games, especially if the playoff is expanded to 16 at some point. Also, don’t forget the extra game a team games if it plays a game outside of North America or has an away game at Hawaii (or is Hawaii, for that matter).
Yes, that could be a lot of games for a college team. One solution is, in order for a conference to have a 4-team championship tournament, each of its teams is limited to 11 regular season games, but when the tournament teams are determined, the remaining teams are allowed to schedule one more conference game.
My Nebraska Cornhuskers finally won and are going to a bowl game! Granted, it likely won’t be a big one, but some bowl will be happy to have Nebraska’s traveling fans, who have not gone to a bowl since 2016.
Neat trivia:
P5 teams that have been to a bowl game since Nebraska: ALL OF THEM.
Now watch there be 83 bowl-eligible teams, and some bowl has to decide: “Hmmm…do we take Nebraska, or (the Texas State-South Alabama loser)?”
Actually, the last time there were two more eligible teams than openings, in 2021, the NCAA said, “You know what? We’re going to allow somebody to create a 42nd bowl so they can all play.” The last time there was one team too many, in 2019, Toledo got left out, but I have a feeling that, if Northwestern, Air Force, and Wake Forest all lose, Cincinnati and Wisconsin both win, and there are an odd number of bowl eligible teams as a result, the NCAA will say, “You know what? We don’t want to punish the odd team out, so we’ll let the 5-7 team that has the highest APR in anyway, and How About That, it’s Auburn.”
There is a way Auburn can lose the Iron Bowl and still get into a bowl without anybody else having to decline a bowl bid or the NCAA having to add additional bowls - if all of these teams lose this weekend:
Northwestern
Air Force
Wake Forest
North Carolina State
Coastal Carolina
Michigan State
Kansas
North Texas
ULM
Oregon State
New Mexico (everybody stay up late; its game at Hawaii starts at 11 PM Eastern)
Appalachian State - and even then, either it does not ask the NCAA for a bowl waiver as its game against Liberty was canceled because of a hurricane, or the NCAA denies it
then there are only 79 bowl eligible teams besides Cincinnati and Wisconsin, which would get the next two spots whether they win or lose (if they win, they’re 6-6; if they lose, they would have the highest APRs among 5-7 teams); Auburn is the next 5-7 team on the APR list, so it gets the last spot.
Iowa State still has a chance at the playoffs if they win out, beating Kansas State this weekend, then winning the Big 12 Championship against Arizona State, BYU, or Colorado, minus some black magic mess.
I would like to apologize to Nebraska and Georgia Tech. I started watching both games at the start of the 4th. I was rooting for the Huskers and Tech. They both seemed to be heading for victory… until I started watching.
Huskers lose a Heartbreaker, Tech let the Dawgs claw back into the game. We are heading into 4th overtime, but I’m not feeling it…
Watching the game end in the 8th overtime was doubly disappointing.
They barely missed the chance to set a new record for longest overtime in FBS, and I was rooting for GT to have the upset.
Especially since the HC of Georgia was looking like an ass with his constant antics on the field (which eventually gave him a warning) and using every timeout each time. I ended up personally rooting against that guy by the end.
Yeah. Watching that was agony. And it sure seemed like Tessatore was slightly biased towards the Dawgs. Just gushing over what a Super Comeback they mounted.
Fuck that! That win is on me! If I hadn’t watched, Tech would have rolled em.
GO BLUE!!!
Go Blue!