New Playoff Format

[csom_1991]

I apologize if this was discussed already but I just heard about this aspect of the playoffs this weekend – I live halfway around the world so I cannot follow as closely as before.

With the new playoff structure, the top 4 teams get a bye. In the first round, teams 5-8 play teams 9-12 with the higher ranked team getting to play the game on their home campus. I think this is a great idea and will go a huge way in answering how much the South/West benefitted from weather changes and playing within their own region in prior bowl seasons.

As such, I think the key for B1G success is getting the 5-8 seeds and eliminating the SEC schools early using this weather advantage. For instance, I think teams like Wisconsin and Iowa have historically been at a huge advantage traveling to play in the warm, humid south with little time to acclimate. If I take the NFL as a proxy (and this is an outlier), but the Miami Dolphins have not won a cold weather game since 2016 and have a 25-47-1 record in outdoor games when the temperature is 40 degrees or colder.

Given that the top 1 or 2 SEC teams will likely still have home field/byes in the first round, I don’t think it will ultimately change the NC by a large degree, but I think it will go a long way in setting the perception on conference strength as more of the first round games go the way of the B1G or Big 12. Even without the huge advantage of cold weather, teams like USC and Washington will benefit huge from time zone and travel time.

Anyway, in an overall disappointing opening weekend of football, I did like to learn of this potential bright spot.

 

[60's Guy]

Interesting outlook...thanks for sharing.

 

[upnorthkid]

I apologize if this was discussed already but I just heard about this aspect of the playoffs this weekend – I live halfway around the world so I cannot follow as closely as before.

With the new playoff structure, the top 4 teams get a bye. In the first round, teams 5-8 play teams 9-12 with the higher ranked team getting to play the game on their home campus. I think this is a great idea and will go a huge way in answering how much the South/West benefitted from weather changes and playing within their own region in prior bowl seasons.

As such, I think the key for B1G success is getting the 5-8 seeds and eliminating the SEC schools early using this weather advantage. For instance, I think teams like Wisconsin and Iowa have historically been at a huge advantage traveling to play in the warm, humid south with little time to acclimate. If I take the NFL as a proxy (and this is an outlier), but the Miami Dolphins have not won a cold weather game since 2016 and have a 25-47-1 record in outdoor games when the temperature is 40 degrees or colder.

Given that the top 1 or 2 SEC teams will likely still have home field/byes in the first round, I don’t think it will ultimately change the NC by a large degree, but I think it will go a long way in setting the perception on conference strength as more of the first round games go the way of the B1G or Big 12. Even without the huge advantage of cold weather, teams like USC and Washington will benefit huge from time zone and travel time.

Anyway, in an overall disappointing opening weekend of football, I did like to learn of this potential bright spot.

if you're playing pure percentages, there will be a BIG and an SEC in the top 4 (4 of the 5 highest ranked CONFERENCE CHAMPIONS) with the 5th conference champ being wherever they are in the polling so you're going to get 1 of each of the B10, B12, ACC, and SEC there. then your last CC will be whoever is the highest ranked G5 team and I'd figure will likely slot in at #12 unless Boise beats Oregon this weekend. Given that, you're going to just have slots 5-11 available.

In most circumstances, I would envision that the loser of the CC game of those top 4 will be the next 4 unless you have an undefeated independent (read ND) or the ACC/B12 having a shitty runner up, which statistically will be quite unlikely to have more than 2 losses (in conference) given the lack of head-to-heads. I can't see the committee punishing say Oregon for losing to OSU in the title game and then dropping them below PSU, especially because this would now incentivize conferences to not put their second best team in the game to give them a better shot at hosting a game. Given that, I would guess you're going to see 1 of each the SEC and B10 locked into the 5-8 (purely because these 2 conferences will get a massive amount of hype so even a 3 loss runner up is still going to be highly ranked). The rest gets a little more dicey just because of media and perceived strength, but there's going to be pretty limited chances for the B10 teams, outside of the CC runner up, to host a game at home (again it's going to be really tough to push a conference's 3rd seed ahead of CC runner ups, ND, and all of the G5) and then for it to get matched up with the SEC. After the first round, everything else is a hosted game (hate this part of the format, would rather first 2 rounds are at high seeds to REWARD the teams that win their conference championship with the revenue and exposure of games at home as well as give them a true home field advantage; you can play the final 4 at neutral sites).

tl;dr: I share your sentiment that it would be fun to see the SEC up here in winter, but the statistical odds of having more than 1 B10 team in the 5-8 seeds is extremely low barring some very weird years/circumstances.

 

[csom_1991]

if you're playing pure percentages, there will be a BIG and an SEC in the top 4 (4 of the 5 highest ranked CONFERENCE CHAMPIONS) with the 5th conference champ being wherever they are in the polling so you're going to get 1 of each of the B10, B12, ACC, and SEC there. then your last CC will be whoever is the highest ranked G5 team and I'd figure will likely slot in at #12 unless Boise beats Oregon this weekend. Given that, you're going to just have slots 5-11 available.

I don't disagree with anything you wrote both with regard to the the 4 byes and likely have 5-8 mixed. Where I think this gets interesting as that I think B1G and SEC will both lobby hard to have as many of the remaining 8 teams as possible so I don't think it will be out of the question for the SEC to say that deserve 5 of the 12 slots in total - meaning probably 1 bye, 2 of teams ranked 5-8 and 2 of the teams ranked 9-12. If we would have applied it to 2023 (granted, conferences have changed a lot), the top 12 in the week 15 ranking were:

Michigan
Washington
Texas
Alabama
Florida State
Georgia
Ohio State
Oregon
Missouri
Penn State
Ole Miss
Oklahoma

If we assumed CC were given preference and the new alignment (I know, completely different conferences now), it would be

byes: Michigan, Alabama, FSU, and the Big 12 Champ (which would exclude both TX and Oklahoma). So, let's assume we swap out Oklahoma as the lowest ranked team and call it B12 Champ.

With this reshuffle, it would be:

1-4: Michigan, Bama, FSU, B12 Champ
5-8: Texas, Washington, Georgia, OSU
9-12: Oregon, Missouri, Penn State, Ole Miss

Home games would have been:
Ole Miss at Texas (weather irrelevant)
Penn State at Washington (weather irrelevant but travel time impact)
Missouri at Georgia (weather irrelevant)
Oregon at OSU (weather some impact)

So, to your point, it is a dream of mine to be able to test the weather hypothesis - but, you are correct that it is unlikely to get a huge sample size because it would require a matchup of an SEC team ranked 9-12 and a cold weather team ranked 5-8 and that, while possible, is still pretty rare given the current top teams in college football.

 

[upnorthkid]

I don't disagree with anything you wrote both with regard to the the 4 byes and likely have 5-8 mixed. Where I think this gets interesting as that I think B1G and SEC will both lobby hard to have as many of the remaining 8 teams as possible so I don't think it will be out of the question for the SEC to say that deserve 5 of the 12 slots in total - meaning probably 1 bye, 2 of teams ranked 5-8 and 2 of the teams ranked 9-12. If we would have applied it to 2023 (granted, conferences have changed a lot), the top 12 in the week 15 ranking were:

Michigan
Washington
Texas
Alabama
Florida State
Georgia
Ohio State
Oregon
Missouri
Penn State
Ole Miss
Oklahoma

If we assumed CC were given preference and the new alignment (I know, completely different conferences now), it would be

byes: Michigan, Alabama, FSU, and the Big 12 Champ (which would exclude both TX and Oklahoma). So, let's assume we swap out Oklahoma as the lowest ranked team and call it B12 Champ.

With this reshuffle, it would be:

1-4: Michigan, Bama, FSU, B12 Champ
5-8: Texas, Washington, Georgia, OSU
9-12: Oregon, Missouri, Penn State, Ole Miss

Home games would have been:
Ole Miss at Texas (weather irrelevant)
Penn State at Washington (weather irrelevant but travel time impact)
Missouri at Georgia (weather irrelevant)
Oregon at OSU (weather some impact)

So, to your point, it is a dream of mine to be able to test the weather hypothesis - but, you are correct that it is unlikely to get a huge sample size because it would require a matchup of an SEC team ranked 9-12 and a cold weather team ranked 5-8 and that, while possible, is still pretty rare given the current top teams in college football.

well written. something i didnt' see was any stipulation on avoiding intraconference games, though truthfully i haven't read all the details. think that'll also be an interesting thing and if the committee avoids it while not having great reasoning other than avoiding it, or welcomes it if it's where the seeding falls.

 

[csom_1991]

think that'll also be an interesting thing and if the committee avoids it while not having great reasoning other than avoiding it, or welcomes it if it's where the seeding falls.

When the new system was announced, I wrote an post about how there would be the possibility for OSU/Mich to play in 3 consecutive games (which is partially true). If both go into 'the game' undefeated, there is a good chance that they both will advance to the conference championship game and regardless of the outcome (though more likely if the both split 1 win each), both are likely to be in the playoffs under that scenario with one getting a bye and one ranked 5-12. Assuming the one ranked 5-12 wins their first game, their next game very will could be against the other for the 3rd time in a row for the conference champ and 3 of 4 games for the non-conference champ. I don't see how this makes for quality TV and the same exact situation could repeat with a combination of Texas/GA/Bama. So, I think they will need to manipulate it without seeming to do so.