Ahead of the Orange Bowl, Notre Dame coach [autotag]Marcus Freeman[/autotag] and Penn State coach James Franklin took part in a joint news conference. Inevitably, the issue of conference membership came up.
Freeman naturally argued that the Irish being independent was a pro and laid out the reasons for it. When Franklin chose to speak about it though, he argued for consistency throughout college football, though he remained respectful toward Freeman and the Irish:
“I think, again, this is no knock on Coach or Notre Dame, but I think everybody should be in a conference. I think everybody should play a conference championship game or no one should play a conference championship game. I think everybody should play the same number of conference games.”
Franklin isn’t so much knocking the Irish’s independence as much as he is knocking the inconsistent structure of college football. We could do a whole series of posts and listicles on this site about this subject, and perhaps we will at some point.
Dan Wetzel of Yahoo Sports wrote an interesting column about this topic, taking particular interest on how the argument about the Irish being held back by their independence has evolved into that independence giving them too much of an advantage. It’s funny how current events can shape opinions on things.
Here’s the full Orange Bowl news conference:
While the outcome of this College Football Playoff is uncertain, what is certain is that this Irish independence discussion is not going away.
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