How great would an 8-team playoff be this year?

[QuaoarsKing]

Fiesta Bowl Bracket
8 Georgia* @ 1 Notre Dame
5 LSU @ 4 Oregon

Sugar Bowl Bracket
7 Stanford @ 2 Alabama
6 Kansas State @ 3 Florida

*-South Carolina and Texas A&M would have an argument for this slot as well, but I bet the committee would give it to Georgia.

Luckily, I predict after a couple years of the 4-team playoff, they'll change the format to this. A lot of coaches and writers have speculated exactly that.

 

[HammerOfTheDogs]

Until the NCAA decides to scrap the bowl system, the playoff thing shouldn't....

..happen. I think playing 15-16 games a year, at that level of competition, is unhealthy for 18-21 year old men. In the lower divisions, they have 11 games and then a 16 team playoff. IN Division I, it'd be 12 regular season games, a Conference Championship game, a Bowl game, AND THEN a playoff.

I think they're going to try to incorporate the Bowls into the playoff system, but don't like the idea of any team winning the Orange Bowl, Rose Bowl, and Sugar Bowl in the same year.

I for one think it should go the other way- play only ten games a year, six conference games, include one FCS team as a conference game, no Conference championship games, have bowl games for everybody with a winning record AND NO TIE-INS (let the bowls determine who'd make the best matchup), and have 10-15 teams claim a national championship every year.

 

[Sutterkane]

NO WAY an 8 team playoff looks like that. They're going to take 3rd and 4th place teams in a conference over the ACC and BIG champions? The SEC gets no more than 2 teams in an 8 team playoff, ever. Book it.

 

[QuaoarsKing]

You're being histrionic. Some years the SEC would only get 2, but there's not really this grand anti-SEC conspiracy people love to believe in. In a year like this one, there's just no way they could justify not having 4 SEC teams in.

 

[sleepy dawg]

You're being histrionic. Some years the SEC would only get 2, but there's not really this grand anti-SEC conspiracy people love to believe in. In a year like this one, there's just no way they could justify not having 4 SEC teams in.

BS. There is absolutely an anti-SEC conspiracy. Just look at the BCS bowls this year. If it wasn't for the SEC, they would just let the top teams play instead of having conference ties.

 

[Dawgzilla]

The SEC cannot just dictate BCS terms to the other conferences. The ONLY way we even have a BCS is because the other AQ conferences agreed to set it all up. Part of that agreement includes having at least one representative from every AQ conference, and no more than 2 from any of the conferences. It protects conferences that have a weak year. Why would the other conferences agree to an arrangement where they might get shut out of the BCS? Without those deals, one or more conferences might have backed out, and then you don't even have a championship game.

That said, they should have had a little more foresight on the possibility of conference re-alignment. The Big East should have lost their AQ status the minute Miami left for the ACC.

 

[QuaoarsKing]

That rule has been there since 1998. It has nothing to do with the SEC and it has occasionally hurt other conferences too: Big 12 in 2008, Big 10 in 2010.
People need to learn that just because everything doesn't go exactly like they want it doesn't mean there's a grand evil conspiracy.

Notice how the playoff that is happening decided not to cap the number of teams per conference. If this conspiracy existed, they definitely would have restricted it to conference champions, like the Big 10 wanted. Instead, the SEC will regularly get 2 teams in.

Similarly, when the playoff expands to 8, the SEC will usually have 3 or 4 teams in.