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When the College Football Playoff was introduced more than a decade ago, and the sports championship evolved from two to four teams, even the system’s creators couldn’t answer some of the questions that arose, or had a hard time trying.
What was the value of winning a conference title when two SEC teams were eligible and two Power 5 conference champions were out? When do face-to-face results matter? And at what point are they fired? How do you measure the strength of a team’s schedule? And to what extent did the strength of a schedule derive from the perceived strength of a contender’s own conference?
When the 12-team CFP is released this fall, it will once again be a learning curve for everyone: fans, coaches, players, media and the selection committee. The committee’s task (and its protocol) remains largely unchanged, but an unprecedented field of 12 teams naturally raises new questions for the group charged with ranking the best teams in the country.
In the spirit of the CFP’s new format, which will guarantee playoff spots for the five highest-ranked conference champions, here are five questions for the committee.
1. Will schedule strength assessments change with conference realignment?
Losing is not something the top national title contenders are accustomed to, but even some coaches hope that will change, and it could complicate things in the committee meeting room.
Historically, the committee has rewarded teams that face tougher opponents, holding wins against the CFP’s top 25 teams in high regard. However, with the Big Ten expanding to 18 teams and the SEC to 16, some CFP contenders now have a tougher path to their own conference championship game. The rigorous schedules of the SEC and Big Ten will make it even more difficult for those respective leagues to produce undefeated or even single-loss conference champions.
According to KeynoteUSA Stats & Information, since 2014, 14 of the 20 teams that participated in the SEC Championship Game had one or no losses. During that same period, 11 of the 20 Big Ten teams that played in the league championship suffered one or no losses.
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According to KeynoteUSA’s preseason FPI, only three teams have at least a 10% chance of finishing the regular season undefeated (Oregon, Notre Dame and Georgia), and none have more than a 20% chance of finishing 12-0. The only other time during the CFP era that no team had more than a 20% chance of finishing undefeated was in 2016, and Alabama was the only Power 5 team to go 12-0 that year.
What will that mean in Selection Central when teams in those leagues have multiple losses and are compared to ACC and Big 12 contenders, teams with better records but against lower-ranked opponents?
“Do I think there will be teams with multiple losses in the playoffs? Yes, there certainly are,” Georgia coach Kirby Smart said. “How do you differentiate? I’ll leave that up to the committee. That’s why we have the system we have… There will be a debate about which football teams are excluded. Ultimately, everyone has a chance to get out.” the grass and act and play and earn the right to enter. Someone is going to be left out and they probably shouldn’t… We had that in the four-team playoffs. There were probably three times when I thought we were one of them. “We are among the four best teams, but we didn’t earn it on the field.”
2. How many SEC and Big Ten teams will fill the bracket?
Using last year’s final CFP standings with conference realignment for 2024, the Big Ten and SEC would have combined for 10 of the 12 spots.
SEC champion Alabama would have been along with Texas, Georgia, Mizzou and Ole Miss. Big Ten champion Michigan would have been joined by Washington (the Pac-12 champion in 2023), Ohio State, Oregon and Penn State.
There is no limit to the number of teams from a conference that can qualify for the playoffs, but there are guaranteed spots for the five highest-ranked conference champions. They will most likely include the champions of the ACC, Big Ten, SEC, Big 12, and a Group of 5 winner. In 2023, those winners were Florida State (ACC), Michigan (Big Ten), Alabama (SEC) , Texas (Big 12, now in the SEC), and Liberty (outside of Conference USA, top-ranked G5 winner).
How often will the ACC and Big 12 conference champions be your sole representatives?
3. How difficult will it be to rank the No. 8 and No. 9 teams with the No. 1 team just around the corner?
The four highest-ranked conference champions will earn a first-round bye. All others will play a first-round game at the home campus of the highest seed. The winner of the match between numbers 8 and 9 will face the best team in the country in the quarterfinals. The loser goes home. Is this something the committee will be thinking about, either consciously or subconsciously, as it compiles its final rankings on Selection Day?
Remember, these games will be played on December 20 and 21 of this year, which could be very cold on some campuses, particularly in the Big Ten. (According to Accuweather.com, Ann Arbor, Michigan, had a high of 38 degrees last December 20 and a low of 21 degrees.)
What advantage could that have if they host a team from the South?
Last year, in a 12-team field, Oregon would have hosted Mizzou. Autzen Stadium has a clear home advantage due to its smaller size and location. The winner of that game would have played Michigan, the number one seed and Big Ten champion.
4. What will be the criteria to classify the best champion of the Group of 5?
Last year, the selection committee’s most controversial ranking outside of the top four was its decision to place the undefeated Liberty at No. 23, which guaranteed the Flames a berth in the Fiesta Bowl. Liberty earned the coveted Group of 5 bid to a New Year’s Six Bowl without beating a single Power 5 opponent. According to KeynoteUSA Stats & Info, the Flames had the easiest schedule in the country last year (No. 133). entering the postseason. Eight of Liberty’s 12 regular season opponents finished with losing records. It was a decision that blatantly defied the committee’s typical reverence for the strength of the schedule and was inconsistent with its justification in the rest of its Top 25.
Had the 12-team playoffs existed in 2023, Liberty would have earned a spot in the field as the top-ranked Group of 5 champion, and the Flames would have edged out No. 12 Oklahoma for the spot. Was Liberty’s selection an anomaly last year? Or is going undefeated the committee’s new standard for the Group of 5, regardless of schedule? If so, does that translate to the rest of your Top 25?
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In the four-team playoff, even the top Group of 5 champions faced a nearly impossible standard to reach the CFP: an undefeated record that included wins against Power 5 opponents and teams ranked in the CFP’s top 25. In 2021, Cincinnati, then a member of the American Athletic Conference, was the only team to reach a CFP semifinal in the decade of the four-team playoffs.
The criteria for making the 12-team field will be heavily scrutinized due to the likelihood of the top-ranked Group of 5 conference champion beating a strong contender at No. 12. Remember, these are not the committee’s top 12 teams. They are the five highest-ranked conference champions plus the next seven highest-ranked teams. So if that fifth champion falls out of the top 12, the unlucky 12th team will be snubbed to make room.
If the fifth champion is not ranked at all, then the selection committee will separately rank the Group of 5 champions and then announce the top school as the highest ranked Group of 5 champion along with the top 25.
Liberty again doesn’t face any Power 4 opponents. Will it matter?
5. How will the path to the playoffs change for the independents?
It’s not just Notre Dame that will be affected by the new format. Oregon State and Washington State will also be treated as independents this fall, as they no longer have a Pac-12 conference championship game to play in.
If any of those schools qualify for the 12-team field, they can’t earn a first-round bye because they can’t finish as one of the four highest-ranked conference champions. They would play a first round match and would need to win four matches in a row to win the national title.
In the past, not having a conference title game was a pro-con situation for the Irish. If they were already in the top four heading into selection day, the Irish didn’t have to risk losing and going down. However, if they were on the bubble, there was no other chance to impress the committee against a ranked opponent. Notre Dame had to sit and wait and wait for help while everyone else competed.
Now?
The Irish should be in for the most part if they finish with no more than one (maybe two) losses, depending on their schedule, results, and how everyone else is doing. There is much less pressure to go undefeated, even without a conference title. However, they still need to beat top opponents such as Texas A&M, Florida State and USC and avoid upsets against Marshall.
Oregon State’s best chance will be Sept. 14 against rival Oregon, as most of the Beavers’ opponents are Mountain West Conference teams through a scheduling alliance. Washington State faces rivals Washington, Texas Tech and Oregon State. Both former Pac-12 teams should leave no doubt that they are playoff material against unranked opponents because they may have limited chances to win in the CFP’s top 25.
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