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Blame it on the presidents from the Division I-A football schools.
That’s what NCAA president Myles Brand said during a halftime interview at the NCAA Division III championship game between Mount Union and Wisconsin-Whitewater.
Brand was asked if we would ever see a playoff format in Division I-A football as there is in every other sport that the NCAA sponsors including Divisions I-AA, II and III football. He said it was up to the presidents to make that decision.
Well, it’s time for this group of highly intelligent men and women to get their collective heads out of the sand and get into the 21st century.
Division I-A football needs a playoff and it would not take long for such a format to rival the NCAA Tournament in basketball, which is the most exciting event in all of American sports.
One reason the presidents say a football playoff is not feasible is time. With the end of the fall semester and finals, there just is not enough time to hold a playoff.
Yeah, right. Penn State can wait 45 days between its final regular-season game and Tuesday’s Orange Bowl matchup with Florida State, but there isn’t enough time for an eight- or 12-team playoff format?
Be serious. How come it’s not a problem in all the other divisions? Don’t Division I-AA, II and III players have to go to class and take final exams? Those schools and the athletes involved make it work and still maintain their academic integrity.
The real reason, of course, is money. This year, the 28 bowl games are expected to pay out between 91-100 million dollars. That does not include how much revenue is generated by advertising, ticket sales, hotel rooms, etc.
The bowl setup, which is almost as old as college football itself, is a huge money maker, not only for the schools and conferences involved in the games, but for the various Chambers of Commerce in the cities that host the games, as well as all the corporate sponsors.
Every bowl game has a corporate sponsor and those companies pay millions of dollars for that right.
The thing is, you can have a playoff system, where a true national champion is crowned, and still have the minor bowls that are a financial boon to the 119 colleges and universities that play Division I-A football.
The ideal playoff would be a 12-team format, with the top four teams receiving first-round byes. It would take a total of four weeks and consist of 11 games. The teams would be playing instead of sitting around for more than a month.
You could incorporate the top 11 bowl games into the playoff with the championship game rotating on an annual basis between the top four bowl game, Rose, Orange, Sugar and Fiesta. That would guarantee that the national championship game is played either indoors or in a warm-weather site, a la the Super Bowl.
Imagine if that system was in place this year? Using the BCS standings, USC, Texas, Penn State and Ohio State would receive first-round byes. The first round would feature fifth-ranked Oregon against No 12 LSU, sixth-ranked Notre Dame would take on No. 11 West Virginia, seventh-ranked Georgia would play No. 10 Virginia Tech and No. 8 Miami against No. 9 Auburn.
In the second round, USC would take on the Miami-Auburn winner, Texas would get the Georgia-Virginia Tech survivor, Penn State would face the Norte Dame-West Virginia winner and Ohio State would play the Oregon-LSU winner. From there, you would have your semifinals and championship game.
You would not want to conflict with the NFL so the first two rounds would be played on Friday and Saturday. You could play one game Friday night and three on Saturday. Play the Saturday games at 1, 4:30 and 8:30 so people can watch every game. The two semifinal games would also be played on the Saturday of Christmas weekend with the national championship game on a Monday night, this year it would be Jan. 2.
You can still have the other 17 bowl games (GMAC, Motor City, Peach, Liberty et al) for the next 34 teams that did not qualify for the championship playoff.
It would generate a lot more money than the current system. That’s a given. If the conference championship games such as the Big 12, SEC and ACC championship games generate about 25 million for those conferences, imagine how much money a championship playoff would produce.
The numbers would be off the chart because the interest level would rival the NCAA basketball tournament.
Too bad that we’ll never see it because the Division I-A presidents would rather cling to an archaic system, which is controlled by corporate interests, than have a playoff system where a true champion is crowned.
Terry Toohey is the assistant sports editor of the Daily Times. To contact him, e-mail ttoohey@delcotimes.com.
