Tag: College Football Playoff Expansion

Latest College Football Playoff rankings further proof of expansion is needed

With the latest CFP rankings being released on Tuesday, it is further proof that we need expansion to happen sooner rather than later.

On Tuesday night the latest College Football Playoff rankings were revealed, just as they were the last three weeks beforehand. With the latest results of the games played over the weekend and how the rankings fell, it was just further proof that they are in need of expansion.

When you break down the top four teams, it is hard to argue with any one of them. Alabama Crimson Tide, Notre Dame Fighting Irish, Clemson Tigers, and the Ohio State Buckeyes have a combined one loss between them. That just so happened to come when Notre Dame and Clemson faced off earlier in the season. One could make an argument that the Buckeyes didn’t play enough games but they are in the top four.

The next four involve a Texas A&M Aggies team that has one loss and that came at the hands of Alabama. Then a two-loss Iowa State Cyclones team. That is a head-scratcher. They lost to Oklahoma State, who was undefeated at the time six weeks ago before going on a five-game winning streak. Circle back to the beginning of the year, they lost a dreadful game to Louisiana-Lafeyette 31-14 to begin the season. Is their resume worthy of No. 6?

The same argument can be made for the Florida Gators. Their first loss of the season came by three points to the No. 5 Aggies, but their last loss over the weekend to Lousiana State should have dropped them by more than one spot. The Tigers had won just three games this year going into the game, in their five losses, LSU has been beaten by 102 combined points this year. They have dealt with COVID-19 issues, top players opting out, and started a true freshman in his first game. The Gators had no business losing that game to LSU.

Then we have the No. 8 Georgia Bulldogs. Another two-loss team in the top eight of the latest CFP rankings. They lost to the No. 2 ranked Alabama Crimson Tide, who are undefeated this year. The Dawgs lost by 17 in that game, then lost to the No. 8 Florida Gators by 16. While those aren’t terrible losses, they did struggle against Kentucky and Mississippi State. They won those games but is their resume worthy of No. 8? Possibly.

The first Group of Five school to join the rankings comes with the Cincinnati Bearcats at No. 9. Luke Fickell has his team sitting at 8-0 and facing a top 20 team in Tulsa for the conference title game. They already have two top 25 victories on their resume (Southern Methodist and Army), winning on Saturday and they will have a third. Should they be higher than they are seeded?

The top 12 rounds out with a two-loss Oklahoma Sooners team ahead of a one-loss Indiana squad, whose only defeat came at the hands of Ohio State by one score. Followed by another Group of Five school in Coastal Carolina, which is also undefeated. They also just beat another playoff hopeful in Brigham Young.

If there was ever a year that the playoffs need to be expanded, it was in 2020. Coastal Carolina and Cincinnati are the two undefeated schools on the outside looking in, while you can make a statement that the top four deserve their spots, for a true championship it should be expanded.

Too late for that to happen this year with Selection Sunday arriving in a few days but this should be a topic going into 2021.

*ESPN published an article detailing what the expanded playoff would look like and the Longhorns would play North Carolina in their matchup.

*link requires a subscription 

So just how many teams would you add for a true playoff? Eight should be the starting point and 16 would make it interesting.

Brian Kelly: “We’re going to play football this year”

Notre Dame head football coach says they’ll play this year and shared thoughts on CFP expansion on today’s appearance on ESPN’s Get Up.

If you’re looking for hope in regards to college football taking place in 2020 then Brian Kelly is the voice you wanted to hear.  Wednesday morning the Notre Dame football coach joined ESPN’s “Get Up” with Mike Greenberg and discussed several topics, including if we’ll get a college football season or not.

To hear the interview in its entirety you can click here as it begins at roughly the 38:30 mark.

If you don’t feel like listening to all of it however, here’s a quick summary of what Kelly had to say.

Everything on the table for 2020 season…

Pages: Page 1, Page 2, Page 3, Page 4, Page 5, Page 6

Athletic Directors Support Expanding College Football Playoff

In a poll done by Stadium, the majority of Athletic Directors are in favor of expansion of the College Football Playoffs.

In a survey done by Stadium asking Athletic Directors over all levels of football, an overwhelming number of Athletic Directors from Power 5 conferences believe that the College Football Playoff’s should be expanded from 4 teams. Nothing will be able to change for the next 6 years, as the current playoff system will remain status quo until this contract expires after the 2026 season concludes.

Stadium found out that just 17% of the polled Athletic Directors would keep the CFP the way it is, with just 4 teams competing for a National Championship. The majority want to expand the playoff to 8 teams, which to me makes the most sense. Although an expanded CFP would create some issue with bowl affiliations to conferences, this version already has done that. For example, the Cotton Bowl was traditionally the runner up of the Big XII against an SEC team, but since the 2014 match-up of Missouri and Oklahoma State, the game hasn’t had the traditional foes.

If the CFP was to expand (in this hypothetical Stadium had expansion to 8 teams), the next question postured to AD’s was how to select the teams to be involved. At the current moment, the selection of teams are more objective instead of having set criteria for the selection committee to follow. Once again, the AD’s have an majority view on how the teams should be selected, each Power 5 champion would get an automatic bid, while two spots would go to at-large teams and the final spot to the highest ranked Group of 5 team.

The final question was where to hold the expanded playoff games, on the campus of the higher seed, a bowl game or neutral site? This poll was split fairly even, with a slight preference for the higher seed getting a game on campus. I love this idea, as southern teams almost never have to deal with weather elements. For instance, taking this model and applying it to last years rankings, Baylor would have had to travel to Columbus to face Ohio State in December.

I am all for the expansion of the College Football Playoff, 8 teams make the most sense to me, each Power 5 champion getting an automatic bid. I do feel like the criteria that was laid out for a G5 team isn’t up to par however. If they are ranked inside the top 10-12, I would be more comfortable including them into the group of 8 teams. Just having the highest ranked team just doesn’t make much sense to me, as last year an #17 Memphis would have qualified for the CFP to face #1 LSU. It seems like a blowout waiting to happen.

Just having the conversation now opens up the idea for CFP expansion in the future. How would you change the CFP format when the current systems contract expires?

CFP: Ban Oklahoma

I say that jokingly about Oklahoma. Of course they deserve to be in this game today even if they’re getting blown out.
The bigger takeaway here is that it’s yet another year where the CFP has at least one dud of a game while the majority of semi-final games have gone that way.

Boy, that escalated quickly.

Yeah, that got out of hand, fast.

LSU is sending Oklahoma into orbit right now leading 49-14 at halftime of the Peach Bowl and will head to the national championship in a couple weeks.

So we’ll hear the same cries for Oklahoma to never get invited back to the College Football Playoff again this off-season, right?

In the world of fairness that’d be more than fair, correct?

They’ve gone to the CFP four times now and have been blown out in three of these games, the only close one being the classic Rose Bowl against Georgia that they lost in 2017.

But only Notre Dame “should never be allowed back in the College Football Playoff,” right Finebaum?

I say that jokingly about Oklahoma. Of course they deserve to be in this game today even if they’re getting blown out.

The bigger takeaway here is that it’s yet another year where the CFP has at least one dud of a game while the majority of semi-final games have gone that way.

This is six years into the College Football Playoff we’ve gone and so far we’ve had two memorable semi-final games (2014 Ohio State over Alabama and 2017 Georgia over Oklahoma).

I know we like to say the playoffs need expanded but do we really need to see what this LSU team would do to Memphis or whatever team you’d put in the No. 8 spot this season?

The idea of more football is great but if it just means for a bunch more routs that the average fan walks away from before halftime does it really have a point?

It’s a logical concept but the difference in tiers in college football has never been greater than it is now. Until that changes your Playoff is going usually leave a lot to be desired regardless of how many teams you let in.

Here’s to hoping Ohio State/Clemson makes up for this domination.