Why Did They Change the College Football Championship Again
The chants that have get the soundtrack of higher football will be heard on repeat in the upcoming weeks. In Indianapolis, the inexplicable site of the College Football Playoff title game on Jan. x, the vocal flex of Southern football superiority will reflect in the heart of Big 10 country.
With No. three Georgia and No. 1 Alabama set to square off in an SEC title game rematch, nosotros're left wondering if in that location's a way for the sport to provide a surprise ending — both in result and, in the bigger flick, how we get here in the future.
With Alabama vs. Georgia, nosotros've gotten the most anticipated event from what's widely regarded as one of America'southward nearly unpredictable sports. And that includes the CFP semifinals again unfolding like a 7-60 minutes Nyquil chug, as the boilerplate margin in these games historically is essentially 3 touchdowns.
Permit's not let the slog of a twenty-four hour period diminish the CFP title game, which should be every bit competitive equally information technology is parochial. No one can debate that Alabama and Georgia shouldn't be hither. At that place aren't any valid arguments about more deserving teams.
It'll be amazing that in that location's not more momentum for an expanded Higher Football Playoff every bit the SEC chants fill Lucas Oil Stadium side by side Monday. The snoozer Fri — again doomed for low weekday ratings —isn't necessarily a fan's statement for an expanded CFP. Information technology's a reminder that more than leaders in the sport should be arguing for an expanded playoff. How can clear-thinking officials let the sport wheeze on similar this at the highest levels? And why are the leagues who need admission the most even so resisting 12 teams? Are they comfortable being relegated to the sport'due south second tier?
This is the 2d time in the eight-year history of the CFP that Georgia and Alabama will square off for the championship. It'due south the third time in the by 11 years that 2 SEC teams are playing each other for the national title. The first of those was an LSU-Alabama rock fight that bellyaching the other commissioners so much that they acquiesced to a playoff.
The electric current version of the four-team playoff appears in its twilight, and it will exist remembered equally a positive incremental development that bested its predecessor just ultimately became dried. The question looms whether some filibusters will delay the inevitable lurch to 12 teams to the end of the electric current contract in 2025. Or, perchance, some blazon of common-sense harmony — hopefully that doesn't let workday afternoon semifinals — can be reached sooner.
Some of Friday's clumsiness is a system born of compromise and backroom deals, as I'yard sure in that location volition be chuckles at NFL and NBA headquarters today that two of the 3 almost valuable games of the season — properties worth hundreds of millions of dollars — played out on a twenty-four hour period many Americans piece of work. (The games started when the Due west Declension was on dejeuner break. Pity the hard-working folks who burnt a day off to watch those lemons.)
Can you imagine the AFC championship game playing out in a similar time slot? How almost a Game seven of the NBA'due south Western Conference finals? In college football, everyone sacrifices for a diminished product that fails to maximize its value, a tired song and trip the light fantastic toe that's in demand of coughing drops and a foot massage.
Change doesn't come piece of cake when there's no one in charge, and that has long been the refrain of a glorious sport that thrives despite leadership, not considering of it.
The electric current CFP contract ends in 2025. The momentum for an expanded playoff before then has slowed from this summertime, when changing the format for the final ii or three years of the current bargain seemed likely. The 12-team playoff coming for 2026 is a almost certainty, as that doesn't crave unanimity on reworking a current contract.
Is the SEC equally far ahead equally it appears? It certain looks that way. The terminal Pac-12 team in the CFP was Washington, six years and three coaches ago. The terminal not-Clemson ACC team was Florida State in the 2014 season. The last Large Ten team to win was Ohio State in the 2014 season. The Large 12 has never appeared in the CFP final and is losing its only squad, Oklahoma, to accomplish the playoff.
What Fri served was a seven-60 minutes infomercial for common sense. Wouldn't Utah, surging at the end of its flavor, want a scissure at the championship? Would Ohio State have held up better against ane of the SEC teams? Could Baylor take withstood punches? We'll never know, as those teams are playing in second-tier bowls that decrease in meaning every year. Wouldn't the sport be improve off with Pitt's Kenny Pickett and Michigan State'due south Kenneth Walker playing with high stakes instead of bowing out?
And so hither we are again. Ii Southern interlopers chanting through Indianapolis. It's a keen game with plenty of juicy storylines. Can Kirby Smart finally topple Nick Saban? Can Georgia shake off a dud of an SEC title game and finally stop all the 1980 jokes?
It'd exist stunning if Alabama wins as decisively as information technology did in the SEC title game, 41-24, as Georgia should bring a more disruptive defensive game plan. (Alabama should be easier to stop without star receiver John Metchie, who got injured in the SEC title game.)
The game will bring reasonable buzz and good ratings. The last championship game between the ii programs was the best of the CFP era, and people tune in to see the elite. But the problems highlighted Friday can mostly be summed up past why the games were played on a non-holiday Fri in the beginning identify.
Competing agendas and lack of centralized determination-making got us here. So did bowing to tradition, every bit the basin organisation still gets disproportionate sway fifty-fifty as players duck out of information technology.
Perhaps some commissioners are comfortable with more juiceless days like Friday. And more juiceless seasons, which have go familiar.
But equally leaders tread water on expansion, we need to retrieve how we got here in the first place. A lot of onetime songs, off key and tired. Maybe the SEC chants volition change the tune.
Source: https://sports.yahoo.com/sec-domination-is-a-reminder-of-whats-missing-in-college-football-071753213.html
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