What the BCS Top 25 would look like ahead of updated College Football Playoff rankings reveal

The BCS Top 25 hasn’t been used since 2013, but there’s still a way to estimate how those rankings would look compared to the College Football Playoff rankings. Ahead of the second rankings reveal Tuesday night, @BCSKnowHow on Twitter projected how the BCS rankings would’ve looked.

The BCS was used from 1998-2013 before the CFP came to be, and last week’s projections differed from the eventual CFP rankings. The second CFP rankings are coming out Tuesday night on ESPN and don’t use as much data as the BCS used to. Instead, the committee tries to use the eye test more than a computer component.

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Here’s how the BCS poll likely would’ve looked through Week 10.

BCS Top 25 ahead of Week 11:

1. Georgia
2. Ohio State
3. Michigan
4. TCU
5. Tennessee
6. Oregon
7. LSU
8. USC
9. Alabama
10. Ole Miss
11. Clemson
12. UCLA
13. Utah
14. Penn State
15. North Carolina
16. NC State
17. Texas
18. Tulane
19. Liberty
20. Kansas State
21. Notre Dame
22. Illinois
23. UCF
24. Washington
25. Baylor

More on the BCS Top 25, College Football Playoff

Prior to the current CFP system, college football was governed by the BCS, whose final rankings were computer generated, and two teams faced off in the national championship to conclude the season. The system also created matchups for four additional prestigious bowl games: the Fiesta Bowl, Orange Bowl, Rose Bowl and Sugar Bowl. 

The BCS formula used a number of factors to produce its list. There were three components to the rankings, with a mix of human and computer generated thoughts: the Harris Poll, the Coaches Poll and the computer rankings. All three parts were weighted equally. 

The Harris and Coaches Polls had values assigned to each spot in reverse order. For example, in the Harris Poll of 25 teams, the top team receives 25 points, the second team receives 24 points, etc. The Coaches Poll had a similar scoring system, although there were fewer voters involved.

The third part, the computer rankings, included six additional polls: Anderson & Hester, Richard Billingsley, Colley Matrix, Kenneth Massey, Jeff Sagarin’s USA Today and Peter Wolfe. In the end, the final values assigned to each team in the three categories are averaged, and the BCS rankings were produced.

Beginning in 2014, the CFP replaced the BCS. Two semifinal games are played around New Year’s Day, and the games take place on a rotating basis at six of the country’s top bowls – the Cotton Bowl, Fiesta Bowl, Orange Bowl, Peach Bowl, Rose Bowl and Sugar Bowl. The two winners advance to the College Football Playoff National Championship. That game is played on a Monday night in the second week of January.

The CFP selection process is more subjective than the BCS, as the teams are decided upon by 13 people and there is no longer a strict computer component. The selection committee is composed of athletic directors, former coaches and student-athletes, and others in the college administration world. The current chair of the committee is Boo Corrigan, the athletic director at NC State.

“The selection committee ranks the teams based on the members’ evaluation of the teams’ performance on the field, using conference championships won, strength of schedule, head-to-head results, and comparison of results against common opponents to decide among teams that are comparable,” the website says.

Additionally, there is a board of governors made up of presidents and chancellors from the 10 FBS conferences plus Notre Dame which governs the administrative actions of the CFP.

College football remains the only college sport in the country without an officially NCAA-sanctioned championship. At its core, the CFP is really a television contract currently owned by ESPN.