It’s bowl season again!

by clay on December 7, 2006

And once again, the debates have begun over who deserves to play for the title, and who doesn't. I'm going to present a (hopefully) well thought out idea for why college football should move to a playoff format over the current BS…er, BCS format. It's going to be long. It involves history. It's also fun.

Let's have a playoff. Each year, use the current BCS ranking system as the seeding for the playoff. Teams which place 1 through 8 in the BCS are in. This is regardless of conference, as some years a conference may place two or even three teams in the playoff. It would be possible to prevent this and only two teams from each conference, but for simplicity's sake I'll ignore that for now. Based on this, I have seeded the playoff for each of the nine years of BCS existence.

2006
1 Ohio State vs 8 Boise State
2 Florida vs 7 Wisconsin
3 Michigan vs 6 Louisville
4 LSU vs 5 USC

2005
1 USC vs 8 Miami (FL)
2 Texas vs 7 Georgia
3 Penn State vs 6 Notre Dame
4 Ohio State vs 5 Oregon

 2004
1 USC vs 8 Virginia Tech
2 Oklahoma vs 7 Georgia
3 Auburn vs 6 Utah
4 Texas vs 5 California
2003
1 Oklahoma vs 8 Tennessee
2 LSU vs 7 Florida State
3 USC vs 6 Texas
4 Michigan vs 5 Ohio State

 2002
1 Miami (FL) vs 8 Kansas State
2 Ohio State vs 7 Oklahoma
3 Georgia vs 6 Washington State
4 USC vs 5 Iowa

 2001
1 Miami (FL) vs 8 Illinois
2 Nebraska vs 7 Texas
3 Colorado vs 6 Tennessee
4 Oregon vs 5 Florida
2000
1 Oklahoma vs 8 Nebraska
2 Florida State vs 7 Florida
3 Miami (FL) vs 6 Oregon State
4 Washington vs 5 Virginia Tech

 1999
1 Florida State vs 8 Michigan
2 Virginia Tech vs 7 Wisconsin
3 Nebraska vs 6 Kansas State
4 Alabama vs 5 Tennessee

1998
1 Tennessee vs 8 Florida
2 Florida State vs 7 Arizona
3 Kansas State vs 6 Texas A&M
4 Ohio State vs 5 UCLA

From that, we get these two sets of data. One is the number of appearances, followed by the number of conference appearances.

Appearances Conferences

5 times
Ohio State (1998, 2002, 2003, 2005, 2006)
USC (2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006)

4 times
Florida (1998, 2000, 2001, 2006)
Florida State (1998, 1999, 2000, 2003)
Miami (FL) (2000, 2001, 2002, 2005)
Oklahoma (2000, 2002, 2003, 2004)
Tennessee (1998, 1999, 2001, 2003)
Texas (2001, 2003, 2004, 2005)

3 times
Georgia (2002, 2004, 2005)
Kansas State (1998, 1999, 2002)
Michigan (1999, 2003, 2006)
Nebraska (1999, 2000, 2001)
Virginia Tech (1999, 2000, 2004)

2 times
LSU (2003, 2006)
Oregon (2001, 2005)
Wisconsin (1999, 2006)

1 time
Alabama (1999)
Arizona (1998)
Auburn (2004)
Boise State (2006)
California (2004)
Colorado (2001)
Illinois (2001)
Iowa (2002)
Louisville (2006)
Notre Dame (2005)
Oregon State (2000)
Penn State (2005)
Texas A&M (1998)
UCLA (1998)
Utah (2004)
Washington (2000)
Washington State (2002)

1998 – Big 12 (2), Pac 10 (2), SEC (2), ACC, Big 10

1999 – ACC (2), Big 10 (2), Big 12 (2), SEC (2)

2000 – ACC (3), Big 12 (2), Pac 10 (2), SEC

2001 – Big 12 (3), SEC (2), ACC, Big 10, Pac 10

2002 – Big 10 (2), Big 12 (2), Pac 10 (2), ACC, SEC

2003 – Big 10 (2), Big 12 (2), SEC (2), ACC, Pac 10

2004 – Big 12 (2), Pac 10 (2), SEC (2), ACC, Mountain West

2005 – Big 10 (2), Pac 10 (2), ACC, Big 12, Independent, SEC

2006 – Big 10 (3), SEC (2), Big East, Pac 10, WAC

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    Oh, for crying out loud! College games aren’t even real football! What’s all the hype?

    (Incidentally, I have stopped saying this to my husband as it has a tendancy to bring out his loud and irritated voice…but I still don’t see the big deal.)

    Sorry, man. I didn’t read you this time. I skimmed very quickly to the bottom. No offense meant.

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