On College Football Week 10 and a Playoff Proposal

The season is shaping up now. The list of conceivable national title game participants is down to eight, and even the eighth (Kansas) is a pretty big stretch.

At this point, I’d to propose my playoff system for college football. Especially since the BCS has added the national championship game the week after the other games, here’s my take:

Use the BCS standings to invite the four highest ranked conference champions (or independents). Two of the four BCS bowls host national semifinals, the other two get the other two conference winners plus at-larges. One of the semifinal hosts gets the title game the next week, and the one seed gets the same site for both games. Obviously, the bowls would work out a rotation policy for this ahead of time. The key here is that you have to win your league to get the invite, and while there are often three teams that claim a place in the BCS, there are rarely five. Obviously, this will never happen because two of the conferences would be left out every year, but it’s a nice thought and only adds one week. By the way, here’s who it would have taken the last four years:

2006: #1 Ohio State vs. #4 Louisville, #2 Florida vs. #3 USC
2005: #1 USC vs. #4 Notre Dame, #2 Texas vs. #3 Penn State
2004: #1 USC vs. #4 Utah, #2 Oklahoma vs. #3 Auburn
2003: #1 Oklahoma vs. #4 Michigan, #2 LSU vs. #3 USC

Now, I know some people will wonder about teams like 2006 Michigan, 2005 Ohio State and Oregon or 2004 Cal and Texas, who are higher ranked than teams in ahead of them. This doesn’t bother me. You should have beat the team who won your conference. College football is regional, and conference wins have to matter. The only conceivable problem is that in the Big Ten, you could have two teams go undefeated and not play each other (actually, if Wisconsin had beat Michigan, that would have happened last year, which might have broken the system entirely). However, that isn’t the BCS’ problem. That is the Big Ten’s problem.

I bring this up now because for the first time in ages, all six major conferences would be in play for a bid. Usually the ACC or Big East or both have lame duck champs, but no more. The four leaders would be Ohio State, BC, LSU and Arizona State right now, with Oregon, Oklahoma and West Virginia very much in play if they won out. I think that covers the best team claimants nicely.

Anyway, the three games of the week:

1. #4 Arizona State at #5 Oregon. Arizona State has to be the most anonymous elite team in the nation: at least KU has had a couple of ESPN games in a row. This week we’ll learn about them. On the other hand, we learned quite a bit about the Ducks after the USC win. They’re averaging 44 points a game.

2. #3 LSU at #17 Alabama. The Saban Bowl is all Bama fans could have asked for: the winner retains control of their destiny in the SEC West. Both teams have had a week off, LSU after a close win over Auburn and Alabama after a blowout of Tennessee, and have to be ready to put their best foot forward. I think Saban has the edge on Les Miles, but I think Miles’ players—many of them Saban’s—have a talent edge on the Crimson Tide.

3. #21 Wisconsin at #1 Ohio State. Another semi-test for the Buckeyes. Yes, Wisconsin is ranked, but their three road games so far have been an almost loss to UNLV, a close loss to Illinois and a terrible loss to Penn State. And with star RB PJ Hill either out or at least slowed down, they would need a huge upset. But stranger things have happened.

Predictions: Arizona State is talented, but Oregon is even better and at home. I think the Ducks take a close one. LSU will be pumped for Alabama and they have too much talent across the board to lose. Finally, Wisconsin is in serious trouble in Columbus. That should be the only blowout of the three.

Picks: Oregon, LSU, Ohio State