College Football Playoff flaws displayed with unjustified seedings in expanded format
Imagine Dayton receiving a higher seed in the NCAA Tournament than the second-place team in the Big 12 because it won its conference?Or last year’s AAC winner, UAB, getting an easier road than Duke or Kentucky? Sounds ridiculous, right? Well, to a much smaller degree, that’s the format of the expanded College Football Playoff.The third and fourth seeds will be going to the winners of the ACC and Big 12, no matter who wins.Those two teams will receive a bye, and as a result an easier path than superior teams from the super conferences, the SEC and Big Ten. I understand the reasoning behind the format of the expanded playoff.
You want to reward conference champions.Still, I think inclusion should be enough of a reward. The ACC and Big 12 champions do not deserve to be seeded above the likes of Ohio State, Georgia, Texas and Ole Miss, among others.
They will clearly not be the third and fourth-best teams in the country, whoever wins those underwhelming leagues.There is a wide gulf that exists between the ACC and Big 12 and the Big Ten and SEC.The aforementioned conferences will almost certainly only be represented by their respective champions.
In the first edition of the committee’s playoff rankings, ACC leader SMU was No.13.
Big 12 leader BYU was ninth. SMU’s best victory is No.18 Pittsburgh.
BYU was fortunate to get past five-loss Utah Saturday night.Its best win is over … SMU. Of course, there is no guarantee one of these teams will represent their respective leagues.
But the other options aren’t much better.You remember how Clemson, a game behind SMU in the ACC, fared against Georgia, right? Crushed, 34-3.Colorado, trailing BYU by one game, doesn’t have a single win over a team in the committee’s rankings. It seems silly that whoever wins the ACC and Big 12 will be seeded higher than the second-best team in the SEC and Big Ten, and have an easier path to a title just because it plays in a considerably weaker league.
Take it a step f...