No way Penn St is the fourth best team.

[MelroseHawkins]

Could a 2 loss Iowa end up killing the chance for a BIG Ten team in the playoffs? Say Iowa runs the table and wins the BIG Title game. Would they still choose Ohio St. taking a loss at that time?

 

[InGoodCo]

I don't disagree that PSU isn't the 4th best team in the country. But, they definitely have a better resume and claim to it then Bama or Clemson at this point

 

[kicker22]

Seems way to simple to me. Way to early for their poll to mean anything at this point so why not put 4 undefeated teams that play each other in the near future. Gives the committee an easy out as the teams immediately below them obviously have the chance to climb as two one of those top 4 will have a loss after this week and OSU and PSU play in a few weeks. All this tells me is that the committee still doesn't have any idea who the top 4 teams will be at the end of the season and are doing this to create hype for upcoming games that will generate media hype and a ton of revenue.

 

[Fryowa]

I don't disagree that PSU isn't the 4th best team in the country. But, they definitely have a better resume and claim to it then Bama or Clemson at this point

I love checking out the composite site. It has a composite ranking of 110 different rating systems. I could literally spend hours looking at it.

https://www.masseyratings.com/cf/compare.htm

It has all 110 rankings in one place and links to each one. Some are total goobers (CPI has Alabama 14th, etc.), but there is also a ton of agreement. If the NCAA insists on using a ranking instead of a "win to get in" playoff, I wish they would pick a certain number of rating systems, under condition that the formulas are known publicly, and composite those together. The top 8 get in. No one could argue because they'd all be plugged into the same formulas, and with a composite ranking you are smoothing out most of the disagreement.

Or better yet make it the Power 5 champs + the next three remaining teams in order of composite ranking. That would make it exciting because an Ohio State for instance could get left out if an Iowa bumped them off the B1G title. But...that same Ohio State could still make it back as a 6/7/8 seed by having a super high composite rating. It would also give really, really good non-P5 teams a chance to make it.

Best of all, it's all based on predefined criteria set before the season and no one could argue about fairness. You could argue about the methods, but not fairness under the methods. It's also pretty tough to argue about being 9th best or 8th best. Wouldn't be perfect, but it'd be a HELL of a lot more perfect than the good old boy shit they have now.

 

[chucktownhawk]

The Big Ten and SEC, only two conferences, make up the top 4. Of course there’s no way two Big Ten teams get in.

Wait a damn second.....Uh, you may want to take another look at #4

 

[InGoodCo]

I love checking out the composite site. It has a composite ranking of 110 different rating systems. I could literally spend hours looking at it.

https://www.masseyratings.com/cf/compare.htm

It has all 110 rankings in one place and links to each one. Some are total goobers (CPI has Alabama 14th, etc.), but there is also a ton of agreement. If the NCAA insists on using a ranking instead of a "win to get in" playoff, I wish they would pick a certain number of rating systems, under condition that the formulas are known publicly, and composite those together. The top 8 get in. No one could argue because they'd all be plugged into the same formulas, and with a composite ranking you are smoothing out most of the disagreement.

Or better yet make it the Power 5 champs + the next three remaining teams in order of composite ranking. That would make it exciting because an Ohio State for instance could get left out if an Iowa bumped them off the B1G title. But...that same Ohio State could still make it back as a 6/7/8 seed by having a super high composite rating. It would also give really, really good non-P5 teams a chance to make it.

Best of all, it's all based on predefined criteria set before the season and no one could argue about fairness. You could argue about the methods, but not fairness under the methods. It's also pretty tough to argue about being 9th best or 8th best. Wouldn't be perfect, but it'd be a HELL of a lot more perfect than the good old boy shit they have now.

College Football is the only major sport I can think of that has no set criteria or rules to making their championship. The committee uses a moving target. Some years it seems like they place value on SOS, when it's convenient, other years it seems like they rely on the eye test. The BCS was flawed, but IMO, in it's current state, the CFP's are worse. They can't move to 8 fast enough for me.

 

[DDThompson]

I don't disagree that PSU isn't the 4th best team in the country. But, they definitely have a better resume and claim to it then Bama or Clemson at this point

This

 

[SmokeTownHawk]

College Football is the only major sport I can think of that has no set criteria or rules to making their championship. The committee uses a moving target. Some years it seems like they place value on SOS, when it's convenient, other years it seems like they rely on the eye test. The BCS was flawed, but IMO, in it's current state, the CFP's are worse. They can't move to 8 fast enough for me.

Gotta somehow keep the former slave states at the top, by any means necessary.

 

[deanvogs]

College Football is the only major sport I can think of that has no set criteria or rules to making their championship. The committee uses a moving target. Some years it seems like they place value on SOS, when it's convenient, other years it seems like they rely on the eye test. The BCS was flawed, but IMO, in it's current state, the CFP's are worse. They can't move to 8 fast enough for me.

Needs to be 16 teams. We have 65 P5 schools so letting roughly 1/4 of them in makes the most sense. 12 out of 32 NFL teams make the playoffs. Heck it feels like over 1/2 the NBA and NHL teams make the playoffs.

Letting more teams in keeps more teams in the hunt which leads to more excitement and more involved fans.

 

[Seth53]

Could a 2 loss Iowa end up killing the chance for a BIG Ten team in the playoffs? Say Iowa runs the table and wins the BIG Title game. Would they still choose Ohio St. taking a loss at that time?

Would be the 2nd time in what, 3 years, that Iowa would dis OSU?

 

[ssckelley]

Could a 2 loss Iowa end up killing the chance for a BIG Ten team in the playoffs? Say Iowa runs the table and wins the BIG Title game. Would they still choose Ohio St. taking a loss at that time?

Let me just say upfront that this is fantasy talk, no way Iowa runs the table. But for the sake of argument let's pretend that lightning strikes and Iowa did run the table, I actually DO think Iowa could sneak into the field of 4. The 2 losses did come early to very good teams and were extremely close. For Iowa to run the table they would have to go through Wisconsin, a 1 loss or undefeated Minnesota, a revived Illinois, at Nebraska (who media still drools over for some reason), and knock out an undefeated Ohio State team. That's 7 wins in a row with some good competition mixed in. People that vote on this kind of stuff like hot teams at the end of the season and Iowa would be one of the hottest teams in college football if they were to win out.

Again, all fantasy talk and not gonna happen.

 

[MelroseHawkins]

Let me just say upfront that this is fantasy talk, no way Iowa runs the table. But for the sake of argument let's pretend that lightning strikes and Iowa did run the table, I actually DO think Iowa could sneak into the field of 4. The 2 losses did come early to very good teams and were extremely close. For Iowa to run the table they would have to go through Wisconsin, a 1 loss or undefeated Minnesota, a revived Illinois, at Nebraska (who media still drools over for some reason), and knock out an undefeated Ohio State team. That's 7 wins in a row with some good competition mixed in. People that vote on this kind of stuff like hot teams at the end of the season and Iowa would be one of the hottest teams in college football if they were to win out.

Again, all fantasy talk and not gonna happen.

This. It's all just theoretical.

 

[Robowe]

Needs to be 16 teams. We have 65 P5 schools so letting roughly 1/4 of them in makes the most sense. 12 out of 32 NFL teams make the playoffs. Heck it feels like over 1/2 the NBA and NHL teams make the playoffs.

Letting more teams in keeps more teams in the hunt which leads to more excitement and more involved fans.

And every other level of college football (FCS, D2, and D3) have at least 16 teams in the playoffs, and they manage to crown a champion and the student athletes manage to go to class.

 

[HuckFinn]

I've been a strong advocate for an 8-team playoff from the beginning. It only adds one weekend and solves almost all of the controversies. Mind boggling that it hasn't happened.

As for the rankings, the one thing I would like to hear is how Notre Dame is ranked higher than Iowa. I'm not implying that Iowa is in fact the better team, just noting that by essentially every objective metric you would use to rank teams (record, SOS, scoring differential etc.), Iowa wins out in the comparison.

I think ND is consistently the most over rated big time football team.