You are here

My College Football Playoff Plan

Submitted by da HOOK on 11 February, 2012 - 20:24

Recall from the previous post the results of the conference championship games:
PAC-10 : USC 29, Oregon 20
WAC : Utah 37, Fresno 28
Big XII : Missouri 38, Texas 32
MWC : Air Force 26, TCU 15
Big Ten : Iowa 22, Ohio St 19
MAC : Ohio 36, Central Mich 17
SEC : Florida 30, Alabama 13
C-USA : Troy 25, Louisiana Tech 16
ACC : Boston College 19, Virginia Tech 16
FE : Connecticut 32, East Carolina 31

Automatic berths in the playoffs were given to the winners of the 10 conference championship games (USC, Utah, Mizzou, Air Force, Iowa, Ohio, Florida, Troy, BC, and UConn) and the losers of the BCS-conference championship games (Oregon, Texas, Ohio St, Alabama, VT). The remaining 17 teams were assigned and all 32 teams ranked by pairwise rankings. These included:

  • RPI (which consisted of won-loss percentage 10%, road won-loss percentage 20%, strength of schedule 25%, opponent's strength of schedule 25%, and strength of victory 20%),
  • Head-to-head wins (which could count more than once),
  • record against common opponents,
  • record against all teams under consideration (minimum 10 games),
  • total wins,
  • record in the last 8 games, and
  • road record.

Teams under consideration were defined as in the top 50 of RPI with at least 15 wins, in the top 10 of RPI, or a conference champ with automatic berth. Teams with an automatic berth were included in pairwise calculations but not in TUC calculations. In fact, common opponents was only calculated when the rest of the computation was inconclusive.

The Final 4 was to be held at the Rose Bowl; regional finals (1 game) were held at the Rose, Sugar, Orange, and Fiesta Bowls; the first and second round games were held at other bowl game sites or domed stadiums. This season had games at Toronto (International Bowl hosted by Univ. at Buffalo), Minneapolis (Mall of America Field / Metrodome hosted by Minnesota), Memphis (Liberty Bowl hosted by Memphis), Dallas (Cotton Bowl hosted by Southern Methodist), Atlanta (Chick-fil-A Bowl hosted by Georgia Tech), Orlando (Citrus Bowl hosted by Central Florida), Boise (Humanitarian Bowl hosted by Boise State), and San Francisco (Emerald Bowl hosted by California-Berkeley). I figured that the first rounds of the NCAA basketball tournament are not held at the same location every year, and there are three games at that location; this will give each bowl location three games every four years.

The #1 overall seed must be a conference champion. Once a conference champion is seeded, teams from that conference may be seeded #2-4 overall or #1 in a regional. Otherwise, the #1 seeds in regionals must be conference champions. In this seeding, #1 won the WAC; #2 won the MWC; #3 finished second in the MWC; and #4 won the SEC. Seeds #5-32 are available to any team, but automatic berths must qualify. The bracket was then assigned 1-32. The schedule was then adjusted to avoid conference matchups in the first round. Teams were then assigned to locations and brackets were adjusted to include host schools in their subregionals. Adjustments were then made for conference representation : PAC and WAC in West region, TEN (now B1G) and MAC in North, SEC in Southeast, XII in South. The ACC needed more teams in North and Southeast regions than in the west. The MWC needed more teams in the West and South regions than in the Southeast. Football East needed more teams in the North and Southeast regions than in the West. Although it did not work out that way, Conference USA was to have more teams in the South and Southeast regions than in the West (they finished with one in S, none in SE, and one in W). In addition, each 8-team regional was adjusted (if necessary) to have a balance of BCS and other FBS teams. Two regionals came out with 4 of each; the other 2 had 5 BCS teams and 3 mid-majors.

The host schools were assigned to their regionals first. Then the #1 seeds were assigned to different regionals based on distance: #1 Utah went to the Cal-Berkeley bowl in the West region; #2 Air Force went to the North region and Boise's bowl; #3 TCU went to the Southern Methodist bowl and the South region; while #4 Florida went to the UCF Bowl in the Southeast region. For the next part, I got a little fuzzy. #5 Texas went to the Georgia Tech bowl in the Southeast, #6 Central Mich went to the Memphis bowl in the South, #7 LSU went to the Buffalo/ International bowl in the North, and #8 Ohio State went to the Minnesota bowl in the North. The Minnesota and Cal bowls fed to the Rose Bowl; the Buffalo and Boise bowls fed to the Fiesta Bowl; the Central Florida and Georgia Tech bowls fed to the Orange Bowl; and the Memphis and Southern Meth bowls fed to the Sugar Bowl. The Final 4 was thus seeded Rose vs Orange and Fiesta vs Sugar.

The seedings were as follows (* indicates automatic qualifier,italics indicate host school):

  1. Utah*
  2. Air Force*
  3. TCU
  4. Florida*
  5. Texas*
  6. Central Mich
  7. LSU
  8. Ohio St*
  9. Virginia Tech*
  10. Missouri*
  11. USC*
  12. East Carolina
  13. California
  14. Connecticut*
  15. Cincinnati
  16. Fresno
  17. Central Florida
  18. Boise St
  19. Ohio*
  20. Wisconsin
  21. Nebraska
  22. Oregon*
  23. Alabama*
  24. Florida St
  25. Oklahoma
  26. Ball St
  27. Tulsa
  28. Kansas
  29. Arkansas
  30. Boston Coll*
  31. Iowa*
  32. Troy*

How the tournament played out:
Rose Bowl Region (West)
Emerald Bowl at San Francisco
1-Utah 56, Troy 20
Ohio 38, @13-Cal 27
Ohio 23, Utah 20
Metrodome at Minneapolis
Oklahoma 28, 8-Ohio St 16
22-Oregon 32, 9-Virginia Tech 29
Oregon 39, Oklahoma 25
Rose Bowl
Oregon 35, Ohio 32

Orange Bowl Region (Southeast)
Citrus Bowl at Orlando
4-Florida 31, Arkansas 19
@Central Florida 45, 16-Fresno 23
Florida 23, @Central Florida 19
Chick-fil-A Bowl at Atlanta
5-Texas 33, Tulsa 31
12-East Carolina 53, Nebraska 37
Texas 49, East Carolina 44
Orange Bowl
Texas 18, Florida 18, Texas wins in overtime

Fiesta Bowl Region (North)
Humanitarian Bowl at Boise
31-Iowa 30, 2-Air Force 9
@Boise St 36, 14-Connecticut 17
Iowa 22, @Boise St 22, Iowa wins in overtime
International Bowl at Toronto
7-LSU 23, Ball St 22
Alabama 26, 10-Missouri 25
LSU 21, Alabama 18
Fiesta Bowl
Iowa 25, LSU 23

Sugar Bowl Region (South)
Cotton Bowl at Dallas
3-TCU 32, Boston Coll 16
15-Cincinnati 37, Wisconsin 29
TCU 39, Cincinnati 33
Liberty Bowl at Memphis
6-Central Mich 29, Kansas 21
11-USC 44, Florida St 34
USC 44, Central Mich 34
Sugar Bowl
TCU 26, USC 24

Final 4 at Rose Bowl
Oregon 35, Texas 10
Iowa 27, TCU 0
Championship game
Oregon 17, Iowa 14

With the current and proposed conference realignment, I will have a different alignment for my second season. Since the conferences are larger, the schedule will also have to change.