Robalini's College Bowl Plan

Robalini's College Bowl Plan
Robert Sterling

If the 2007 college football didn't settle that the current NCAA Bowl Championship Series is a joke, it's because it pretty much had already been settled long ago. Until now, the most egregious foul occurred in 2003, when USC, the best team in football, was left out of the championship game due to a dubious computer ranking of #3. (Did Diebold make the computers?) But this season, the general conceit of the BCS championship, that at the end of the year two teams would clearly set themselves apart from the rest of the pack, has been proven a fraud. Indeed, the only team to even indicate it could theoretically be unbeatable was Hawaii, and they still were snubbed from the championship due to the inferior conference they play in.

The biggest change in recent years was to increase the BCS to five games rather than four, giving viewers the four traditional major Bowl games (the Rose, Fiesta, Orange & Sugar) near New Years and a championship game a week later. Though it certainly increased college football television revenues (at least in the short term) by adding the game, rather than improving the system, it made it worse, making the big four bowl games nothing more than glorified exhibitions.

Out of this chaos comes my modest proposal, which is (among millions of others) a plan to create a true playoff system for an NCAA college football championship. Like every other one out there, it has one decided virtue: it is better than the system currently in place.

With this plan, I had a few goals:

1. Respect the traditions of the big four bowl games as much as possible, even more so than the current system does;
2. Make sure that the big four bowls actually were a central part of crowning the championship;
3. Allow bowl games with notable histories of their own to be included in the mix; and, perhaps most important:
4. Create a playoff system that produces an actual season championship.

Taken this together, here are the basics of the plans...

Sixteen teams make the playoffs, consisting of the following:

Automatic bids:

* The top two teams from the ACC, Big 12, Big Ten, Pac-10 and SEC;
* The top team from the Big East;
* Notre Dame if it is in the top 16 of the AP poll;

The other four or five spaces will be filled by the following:

* Any of the other five conference champions who are in the top 25 of the AP poll;
* Any other team that is in the top eight of the AP poll;

The priority of the above will be according to their AP ranking. If this total does not equal sixteen teams, then the rest of the spots will be filled according to AP ranking.

(Granted, the AP has refused to be included in the current system, but in this theoretical example, the AP would agree simply because it would be less controversial.)

With this system in place, there wouldn't have been much controversy over the sixteen teams picked this season. In fact, the only team that would have qualified before this last Saturday that wasn't in the AP top sixteen would be number 21 BYU, who would've replaced number sixteen Clemson. (I think teams should be rewarded for being conference champions.)

Why did I say "before" this last Saturday rather than after? Because many of last weekend's games would be redundant under my plan, as five conference championships would be part of the playoffs.

That's correct: instead of being played the first Saturday in December with the Army-Navy game, The ACC, Big 12 and the SEC championships would instead be played the second Saturday of December, as part of the opening round of playoff bowl games. Under new banners as the Peach Bowl (ACC), the Cotton Bowl (Big 12) and the Liberty Bowl (SEC), these games would be joined by two new conference championship games: the Gator Bowl (Big Ten) and the Holiday Bowl (Pac-10.) A sixth bowl game, the Florida Citrus Bowl, would be hosted by the Big East champion. Two more bowl games, the Independence Bowl and the Sun Bowl, would round out the "Super Saturday" of eight bowl games that would knock off eight teams.

Under this scenario, here's how the matchup would've looked this coming weekend, trying to respect rankings where possible and historical traditions in which team goes to the Independence Bowl and Sun Bowl:

Cotton Bowl (Dallas) Big 12 - Missouri (1) - Oklahoma (9)
Florida Citrus Bowl (Orlando) Big East Host - West Virginia (2) - Brigham Young (21)
Gator Bowl (Jacksonville) Big Ten - Ohio State (3) - Illinois (15)
Holiday Bowl (San Diego) Pac-10 - USC (8) - Arizona State (13)
Independence Bowl (Shreveport) - Georgia (4) - Hawaii (11)
Liberty Bowl (Memphis) SEC - LSU (5) - Tennessee (14)
Peach Bowl (Atlanta) ACC - Virginia Tech (6) - Boston College (12)
Sun Bowl (El Paso) - Kansas (7) - Florida (10)

Let's pretend the only upsets this coming weekend are Oklahoma beating Missouri (which they did last weekend) and Hawaii upsetting Georgia (which may not really be an upset, since Hawaii is undefeated.) That would lead to the four traditional big bowl games on January 1st and 2nd, with the traditional teams tied to them:

Rose Bowl - Ohio State (3, Big Ten Champion) - USC (8, Pac-10 Champion)
Fiesta Bowl Oklahoma (9, Big 12 Champion) - Hawaii (11)
Orange Bowl Virginia Tech (6, ACC Champion) - West Virginia (2, Big East Champion)
Sugar Bowl LSU (5, SEC Champion) - Kansas (7)

On the Thursday and Friday before the NFL divisional playoff weekend (January 8-9 to January 14-15), two semifinal game would be played between the four big bowl champs, with the top seeding facing the bottom on Thursday night and the other two on Friday night.

This would lead to the college football championship game, which would happen a week later on the Saturday before the two NFL conference championships. Imagine what a weekend of football that would be: the college football title game followed by the two matchups leading to the Super Bowl. Be sure to stock up on beer!

The only possible glitch in the system is continued snubbing of the five minor football conference teams. Hawaii and BYU would make it in my system, but it would be good to include a clause that any undefeated team gets an automatic bid so a team like Hawaii this year wouldn't be snubbed.

But otherwise, this system really works well. It strengthens the value of the traditional big four bowls. It strengthens the value of eight traditionally noted bowl games. It ensures the five major conferences have a place on the New Years Day bowl games. And it ultimately creates a playoff system that would likely boost college football television revenues substantially. That's probably the biggest key of all, and why I think my proposed system would be a smashing success.