The College Football Playoff Selection Committee’s 4-team playoff field generated very little controversy this season, but the process—and the rankings that it yielded—raised two concerns for future seasons.
The first is the committee’s lack of emphasis on conference championships, exhibited by its ranking of Iowa, which narrowly lost in the Big Ten Championship Game, ahead of Stanford, the Pac-12 champion. The committee ranked Iowa #5 and Stanford #6, thereby suggesting that if North Carolina had upset Clemson late Saturday night, the committee would have picked Iowa—not Stanford—for the last playoff spot.
The committee’s protocol says that it may “select a non-champion or independent under circumstances where that particular non-champion or independent is unequivocally” better than a conference champion with which it is competing for a spot. But there’s no way the committee can make a convincing case that Iowa, which is nearly a touchdown underdog to Stanford in the Rose Bowl, is “unequivocally” better than the Cardinal. It could make a better case that Iowa has been better (a more important consideration)—indeed, the Anderson & Hester Rankings, which I co-created and which are published in the Dallas Morning News, rank the Hawkeyes a bit ahead of the Cardinal based on season-long success. But even then it’s pretty close: The Hawkeyes went 12-1 versus the nation’s 40th-toughest schedule, while the Cardinal went 11-2 versus the nation’s 12th-toughest schedule. There’s not a lot of separation there.
The best selection process would be to use the old Bowl Championship Series formula, take the teams ranked #1-3 in the BCS Standings, and have the fourth team be the highest-ranked conference champion remaining (unless the #4 team is an independent, in which case that team should get the nod). Under that process, if North Carolina had upset Clemson, Stanford would have been the likely beneficiary.
As long as the committee is deciding things, it should follow this lead and give enough weight to conference championships that a champion who’s within striking distance of the fourth spot should prevail over a non-champion (but not an independent) and claim that spot. It’s simply better for the sport to have teams—and champions—from different regions represented in the playoff. It is clear enough who the conference champions are. It’s not as clear whether the Pac-12 champion is—or has been—the equal of a champion from another conference.
None of this is to suggest that Stanford should have made the 4-team playoff field. The committee got the four teams right: ACC champion Clemson, SEC champion Alabama, Big Ten champion Michigan State, and Big 12 champion Oklahoma. But Stanford should have been the next in line for a playoff spot.
The other problem that emerged this season was the committee’s inability to consider the sites of games when seeding the teams. Had Oklahoma been ranked #3 by the committee instead of #4, then #2 (in the committee’s rankings) Alabama would have had to play something of a road game, at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas—thereby placing the #3 team in a better position than #2.
The easiest remedy would be to let the committee adjust the seedings, where appropriate, to avoid such situations. But the committee isn’t currently allowed to do this. The problem was avoided this season because the committee decided that Michigan State was #3 on the merits and Oklahoma was #4, so the Spartans will head to Dallas and the Sooners will go to the Orange Bowl in Miami (to play #1 Clemson). But what if the University of Miami had been the #4 team? Under the current rules, Clemson would have had to play a de facto road game as its reward for being the top seed.
With all of that said, the matchups—and sites—worked out fine, and college football once again enjoyed the finest regular season in all of sports. Next up is an enticing bowl season, featuring a mix of playoff bowl games, tradition-rich matchups like the Pac-12-Big Ten pairing in the Rose Bowl, and a host of lesser games for those (like this author) who can’t get enough. As long as the powers-that-be hold the line and limit the playoff field to four teams, both college football’s unparalleled regular season and its Tocquevillian bowl games (the Pasadena Tournament of Roses is among America’s finest civil associations) will be preserved.
Anderson, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, is co-creator (with Chris Hester) of the Anderson & Hester Rankings, which were part of the BCS throughout its entire 16-year run and are now published by the Dallas Morning News.
