Upon the introduction of the College Football Playoff’s expanded 12-team structure last season, the inaugural weekend could reasonably be described as uneventful.
Looking back: Notre Dame quickly dominated Indiana, with the outcome virtually decided by halftime. SMU appeared unprepared, suffering a significant 28-point defeat against Penn State. Clemson held on for a period but posed no serious challenge to Texas. Meanwhile, in a frigid Columbus evening, Ohio State commenced its national championship quest with a decisive 42-17 victory over Tennessee.
A quartet of matches. A quartet of one-sided contests. Predictably, this led to ample criticism from those opposing playoff expansion, eager to highlight the absence of excitement in the opening round.
Therefore, consider this a reasonable caution as we approach the sophomore year of the 12-team playoff: a similar scenario might easily unfold once more.
This is not a definitive forecast. Betting experts anticipate the Alabama-Oklahoma matchup will be competitive. Miami versus Texas A&M carries an air of uncertainty. Furthermore, it’s conceivable that teams like Tulane or James Madison could emulate an NCAA basketball tournament dark horse, potentially unsettling Ole Miss or Oregon.
However, should the initial round’s thrill once again diminish, here’s a suggestion: remain calm.
This does not imply a flaw within college football’s post-season structure. Instead, it indicates that college football’s post-season is simply … typical.
Ohio State decisively defeated Tennessee in the opening phase of last year’s College Football Playoff. Subsequently, the Buckeyes also triumphed over Oregon, Texas, and Notre Dame on their path to securing a national title. (Photo credit: David J. Griffin/Getty Images)
(Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
During the previous NFL season, the typical winning difference in its initial playoff matchups exceeded 15 points, with just one truly competitive contest among six. The NBA playoffs saw two complete sweeps in the first round, alongside three series concluding 4-1. For the NHL, merely two out of eight first-round series extended to a decisive seventh game.
Do any of these athletic competitions face an ongoing identity struggle regarding their post-season events? Absolutely not.
Such is the inherent characteristic of tournament competition across any sport when teams lacking a genuine prospect of clinching the championship are included. Tightly contested opening-round games are unusual, rather than commonplace. It is typically only upon reaching the ultimate playoff phase, where top contenders clash, that one can realistically anticipate truly memorable encounters.
Even at that point, assurances are absent, given the unpredictable nature of sports where outcomes are never predetermined.
College football’s prevailing mindset, conversely, consistently implies an issue unless presented with a nail-biting, single-score, fourth-quarter struggle, featuring teams exchanging blows intensely for three continuous hours.
Such an expectation is not only impractical but has also never represented the standard across any iteration of college football’s post-season history.
Considering the combined periods of the Bowl Coalition, Bowl Alliance, and BCS, which aimed to set the top two teams against each other for the national championship, the typical victory margin in those confrontations stood at 16.3 points. Over that span of 22 years, merely five championship contests could be classified as iconic: Florida State’s win against Nebraska in 1993, Ohio State’s triumph over Miami in 2002, Texas’s defeat of USC in 2005, Auburn’s victory against Oregon in 2010, and Florida State’s success over Auburn in 2013.
A significantly greater number of outcomes were utterly disappointing.
College football generated increased unnecessary alarm upon its shift to the four-team College Football Playoff. During the initial eight years of this arrangement, only three of the 16 semifinal matchups concluded with a winning difference under ten points.
However, an unexpected turn of events occurred on New Year’s Eve of 2022. Both semifinal contests were decided on the final play, as TCU unexpectedly defeated Michigan, and Ohio State narrowly missed a game-winning field goal against Georgia at the stroke of midnight. The following year, Michigan’s defensive stop at the goal line in overtime culminated in an unforgettable Rose Bowl, and later that same evening, Texas came agonizingly close on several attempts to score a decisive touchdown against Washington.
What prompted such an abrupt reversal in the level of excitement? It might have been nothing more than statistical probabilities evening out. Alternatively, it could be attributed to Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) policies and the transfer portal starting to distribute player talent more uniformly.
Regardless, precisely as the four-team playoff was finding its stride, the sport’s governing bodies made the decision to enlarge it.
Notwithstanding certain deficiencies in the selection methodology, primarily stemming from unchecked conference growth, this choice was not erroneous. Television viewership figures for the initial round proved robust, even with lopsided scores and several matchups coinciding with NFL games. Two of last season’s four quarterfinal contests were excellent. Both semifinal encounters were extremely engaging, maintaining suspense until their conclusions. Furthermore, while Ohio State’s 34-23 triumph against Notre Dame in the national title match might not be considered legendary, it remained a competitive battle for the entire duration.
No more can be reasonably expected.
It is highly probable that, given time for the 12-team playoff to mature and establish itself, we will witness an increase in evenly matched contests. Eventually, a team from the Group of Five conferences will overcome a traditional powerhouse, becoming the most significant sports narrative in the United States.
Much like a 16th-seeded team triumphing over a top seed in the NCAA basketball championship, such an eventuality is merely pending.
However, the entity known as College Football Inc. exhibits perpetual agitation. No aspect is permitted to simply evolve naturally. Should a prominent figure express dissatisfaction over a team’s exclusion, an immediate urge arises to dismantle the entire system and reconstruct it. Consequently, the fretting about lopsided results—as if their avoidance were even feasible—becomes amplified.
(One can reliably anticipate social media commentary on Saturdays expressing longing for Notre Dame should James Madison find itself trailing Oregon by a substantial margin.)
Currently, it appears we are already progressing towards a 16-team playoff, or potentially an even larger structure. Given the ongoing dissatisfaction stemming from the selection procedure of two Sundays prior, a fresh impetus exists among conference leaders to deliberate on an enlarged format, possibly taking effect as early as the upcoming year.
The motivation? Not primarily financial, nor a belief that initial round contests will improve with expansion to 16 teams. Rather, it’s straightforward: dominant conferences believe a greater number of their squads deserve inclusion.
Subsequently, following the inaugural year of the 16-team playoff, the pattern of apprehension will recommence.
Nevertheless, eventually, both the governing bodies and supporters of college football must acclimatize and adopt a pragmatic perspective regarding the playoff’s anticipated outcomes.
Should it resemble other sports featuring extensive tournament brackets, lopsided victories will almost invariably surpass closely contested games in the opening stage.
What makes that inherently objectionable?
