BCS vs. Playoff

Let me start out by saying that I have never had a problem with the BCS as it currently stands. Most of the time it ends up getting it right and it is a much better system then we had before when everyone just went to their own bowl games. My fear with a playoff system is that it would dilute college football’s regular season which is the best in any sport. There have always been too many questions with a playoff system in my opinion. How many teams, where do they play, what about the bowl games, when would a playoff take place? I don’t like a four or eight team playoff because I still think you would have teams mad that they were left out. A sixteen game playoff would involve too many teams and dilute the regular season as it is in its current format.

Although I am not activity campaigning to change the BCS, I did come up with one idea for a playoff system that I would not mind seeing implemented. Before I get into what my idea is I should say that this system was designed as something that realistically could get approved, which means that you have to give perks to the power schools. So here’s my idea (and with all that build up I hope that you like it):

A 64 team college football playoff.

You have probably now stopped reading and think that I am crazy, but here me out. The NCAA basketball tournament is arguably the best post-season tournament in sports. Every March millions of people who know nothing about basketball fill out their brackets in office pools all across America. The tournament attracts sports fans like me who may only watch a few basketball games all year, but will make sure that they are on the couch for all the action.

In order to fit in the playoff and to make sure that the regular season does not lose too much meaning, the regular season would be reduced from twelve to nine games. Eight of these games would be conference games with one nonconference game. This would allow the regular season to remain significant because 8 of the 9 games would have a direct impact on the conference race. The regular season would start on Labor Day weekend and end nine weeks later (around the first week of November). There would then be one off week between the regular season and playoff. There would then be five weeks of playoff games played at campus sights, with a national championship game being played on New Year’s Day. The bowl games are completely gone.

The 64 teams would come from all Division 1-A conferences. The ACC, Big 12, Big Ten, Pac-10, and SEC would each qualify their top six teams. The Big East would qualify 4 teams. The MAC, Conference USA, WAC, Sun Belt, and Mountain West would each qualify 3 teams. That makes for 49 automatic qualifiers. The next group of teams to qualify would be any team left that has 7 wins. Navy, Notre Dame, and Army would need 6 wins to qualify. The previous year’s national champion would also automatically qualify if they had not already qualified. To fill out the remaining spots a BCS style ranking system would be used to rank all the teams and the highest ranked teams that have not already made the tournament would be put in.

The national championship game would rotate where it is held each year, much like the Super Bowl. The rest of the games would be played on campus. Home field advantage would first be given to conference champions. Second it would go to a team if they play in a stadium that can hold 80,000+ people. Then it would be based on who has the better record or who is ranked higher in the poll.

The playoff bracket would be selected by a committee of four members selected by the NCAA. The committee would have two new members every year and no member could serve for more than two years. When placing teams the committee would follow three basic rules; 1. Try to allow road teams to play in their region in the first and second round. 2. Avoid teams from the same conference meeting each other in the first and second round. 3. Avoid conference champions from meeting in the first and second round.

TV rights for the playoff would be decided by the NCAA, which would give payouts to teams based on how long they remain in the playoff, like they do for bowl games now. It would not matter where the game is played. (So a Notre Dame home playoff game would not be on NBC unless NBC bought the rights to the whole playoff.) For the first round games would be played on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday with games starting at Noon, 3:30, 7:00, and 10:00 each day.

So there you go. I think that this plan would be great for college football and would have the best chance of getting approved over any other playoff system that I have seen. Like I said to start, I am not out to change the BCS just giving another option that would work.