COLUMN: CFP to be just another 'participation' trophy?
Alabama finished 2020 with an undefeated record and a national championship. In two years, the path to a title may well be changing. (UA Media Relations)
By TIM GAYLE
A sub-group of College Football Playoff’s management committee presented a proposal late last week to change the current four-team format to a 12-team event.
The proposal was made to the full CFP management committee and is the first step in a process that will not conclude before this fall.
Almost immediately, two opposing sides lined up in support of and against the proposal. Those who support it, including the sub-group that proposed it, admit it is merely a participation move to allow more teams into the playoffs.
“The four-team playoff has been a really big success since it was created nine years ago … and it remains a big success,” said Bill Hancock, executive director of the College Football Playoff. “It’s been great for college football. We’ve been delighted with it. But our board asked the management committee to review the CFP when we were six years in. This proposal, at its heart, was created to provide more participation for more players and more schools.”
Those lining up in opposition certainly have valid arguments, although any change this radical can expect to be met with resistance.
“I’ve been happy at four (teams),” Southeastern Conference commissioner Greg Sankey said. “I’ve been very clear about that. It's worked. It’s served its purposes, yet we have to take a step back and look at the game, look at what we’re being asked to do as leaders. So that work has produced an opportunity for a conversation around a 12-team College Football Playoff format.
“Will there be detractors? Will there be criticism? Absolutely, but we were charged with leading a conversation, and we know that not everything is going to be perfect or ideal.”
Sankey was one of four members in the working group, along with Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby, Mountain West Conference commissioner Craig Thompson and Notre Dame athletic director Jack Swarbrick.
The working group was appointed by their management committee colleagues and has met over a two-year period to discuss possible new formats. The proposal calls for the bracket each year to include the six highest-ranked conference champions, plus the six highest-ranked other teams as determined by the College Football Playoff selection committee. No conference would qualify automatically and there would be no limit on the number of participants from a conference.
The four highest-ranked conference champions would be seeded one through four and each would receive a first-round bye, while teams seeded five through 12 would play each other in the first round on the home field of the higher-ranked team. Under the proposal, the quarterfinals and semifinals would be played in bowl games. The championship game would continue to be at a neutral site, as under the current format.
The inclusion of six conference champions automatically injects a new flavor outside of the Power Five into the equation. A quick glance at the previous seven College Football Playoff rankings list only two teams (Central Florida in 2017 and 2018 and Cincinnati in 2020) that would qualify under the proposed format as conference champions ranked among the top 12 teams.
A third team, Coastal Carolina, had advanced to the Sun Belt Conference championship game in 2020 but it was canceled by COVID-19.
“One of the things we were responding to was the concentration that’s occurred (where) 78.5 percent of all the opportunities in the first seven years have gone to five teams,” Swarbrick said. “We think that (proposed) model keeps a lot more teams alive a lot longer into the season and generates interest.”
Another part of the proposal dictates the four highest ranked conference champions are seeded one through four and that Notre Dame, an independent, can never be ranked among the top four. That turns four of the last five CFP rankings on their head.
In 2016, at-large Ohio State was ranked third while Big 10 champ Penn State finished fifth and was not included in the playoff. Under the proposed new format, No. 4 Washington slides up to third, Penn State moves up to fourth and Ohio State is ranked fifth.
In 2017, at-large Alabama (ranked fourth) and Big 10 champion Ohio State (ranked fifth) would swap places, while Notre Dame’s inclusion among the final four in 2018 and 2020 would not stand under the proposed format.
Had the 12-team format been available this past season, Southeastern Conference champion Alabama, Atlantic Coast Conference champion Clemson, Big 10 champion Ohio State and Big 12 champ Oklahoma (ranked sixth in the CFP rankings) would have drawn first-round byes, while No. 4 Notre Dame would be reseeded as No. 5 and No. 5 Texas A&M would have slipped to sixth. Coastal Carolina, the No. 12 seed, would have traveled to Notre Dame, No. 11 Indiana would have traveled to Texas A&M, No. 10 Iowa State would have traveled to No. 7 Florida and No. 9 Georgia would have traveled to No. 8 Cincinnati.
In the quarterfinals, at three pre-selected New Year’s Day bowl games, the Georgia-Cincinnati winner would have played Alabama, the Florida-Iowa State winner would have played Clemson, the Texas A&M-Indiana winner would have played Ohio State and the Notre Dame-Coastal Carolina winner would have played Oklahoma.
The semifinals would have been a week later in two pre-determined bowls, although the sub-group has indicated they do not favor the current doubleheader format.
Last year’s CFP rankings, after including the six conference champions (Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State, Oklahoma, American Athletic Conference champ Cincinnati and Sun Belt Conference champ Coastal Carolina), featured four teams from the Southeastern Conference, which could include three matchups in one season -- a regular-season game, an SEC Championship Game meeting and a College Football Playoff encounter.
It could include three road CFP games for financially strapped fans as well.
“I would suggest that there’s a pretty good alternative right in your living room if you don’t want to travel to the games,” Bowlsby said. “I’m sure we have some people that travel three weeks in a row, but the majority pick and choose. Some go to champ games, some go to bowl games. I don’t think it’s accurate to assume it’s the same cadre of people that go to every place on every occasion.”
The CFP management committee members are AAC commissioner Mike Aresco, Bowlsby, Sun Belt commissioner Keith Gill, Conference USA commissioner Judy MacLeod, ACC commissioner Jim Phillips, Sankey, Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott, Mid-American Conference commissioner John Steinbrecher, Swarbrick, Thompson and Big 10 commissioner Kevin Warren.
The next step in the process is for the 11-member management committee to review the recommendation at its upcoming meeting in Chicago on Thursday and Friday. If the management committee endorses the proposal, it will forward a recommendation to the CFP board of managers, which will meet June 22 in Dallas. Any decision on changing the format will be made by the board.
The date of implementation of a potential new format was not a part of the working group’s proposal and would be a matter considered if any recommendation is approved by the board of managers. Hancock said the format will not change this year or next year. The current agreements for the four-team CFP extend through the 2025-26 season.
While the playoff calendar is still to be worked out, the tentative plan calls for first-round games on campus sometime during the two-week period after conference championship games (which is also the time frame where players take their final fall exams). The quarterfinals would be played on Jan. 1.
The playoff bracket would follow the rankings, with no modifications made to avoid rematches. The bracket remains unchanged throughout the playoff with no reseeding.
Among the questions entertained by the working group in a nationwide teleconference was whether first-round losers in mid-December could then turn around and accept a bowl invitation. As Swarbrick noted, that is not an issue the working group dealt with but members of the sub-group did indicate a need to include the bowls in the new format as much as possible.
“I think certainly the history and the commitment to bowls have made to the process and giving them an opportunity to continue to be relevant in the system,” Thompson said.
“I would add this model, in conjunction with the bowls, gives college football an opportunity to reassert ownership of New Year's Eve and New Year's Day in a really powerful way,” Swarbrick said.
The issue of playing first-round games in Northern cities is certainly an issue. The average December temperature in South Bend is 37 degrees; 36 degrees in East Lansing, Mich.; and 33 degrees in Camp Randall, Wisc. Playing games in early January can be even more hazardous.
“I’m not sure that playing in East Lansing, Mich., on Jan. 7 is a really good idea,” Bowlsby said. “I think those games probably do in significant ways favor warm weather schools. But there has to be some accounting taken of stadiums that have to be winterized in the months of December and January and the like.”
As the season would be extended another week into mid-January, the group has to consider its effect on student-athletes, which by that time would be missing parts of their spring semester. Currently, football players take a lighter academic load in the fall semester, then load up in the spring
“The presidents gave us a list of evaluation criteria to focus on and first on that list was student health and welfare with several sub-elements of that,” Swarbrick said. “I think it's safe to say that clearly sort of objectively the majority of teams are only going to play one (additional) game. Some will play no additional games from what they would in a regular season.
“Right now a football player has a 3 percent chance of participating in the postseason tournament. His colleagues in basketball and baseball and hockey, they have a 24, 22 percent chance of participating.
So we were trying to balance the two.”
Each member of the sub-group said they came into the assignment with a certain set of goals and criteria, but gradually all arrived at the same place.
“I really feel like everybody that was in the room was looking at this from the standpoint of what is best for college football and what is best for the participants,” Bowlsby said. “You know, as we start to see some young people opt out of their postseason experiences, you wonder if there will be as much of that among a larger number of teams that have a dog in the fight for a national championship.
“You know, I think over time we evolved. I think we’ve had the luxury of taking something that was better than anything we’ve ever had before and trying to find ways to make it better. I think, from my vantage point, that is how we’ve arrived where we are.”