I know you need a 12 team conference to hold a championship in FB. However, I was wondering if the NCAA will allow a semifinal and championship if you have 15 or 16 team conference.

In addition, will those two extra games (semifinals) make enough money to make it worthwhile.

I realize this gets even further from a Div-1 playoff and with so many teams, you lose the identity of the conference, but just wondering.

The ACC, SEC or Big10 could easily expand to 16. The question is would it be worth it if the NCAA said ok to semifinals in addition to the championship game.

SEC - TAM, UT, OU, and UM or NU.
Big10 - NU, UM, SU, RU, ND.
ACC - PSU, RU, SU, Pitt or UConn.

With 15 teams you could goto 5 team divisions with each champion and the best runner up advancing. For 16 teams, you could have four 4-team divisions with the champions advancing. Would be hard to balance the schedule though.

Just curious. This would only add to the number of games played, so my guess would be the NCAA would say no. But what if they said yes, would the semifinal games make enough $$$ to be worthwhile?

^ This would require enough round robin play to justify. So you would need at least a 13-game season, unless you eliminated ooc's. With a 13-game season and 2 extra weeks for semifinals, you are looking at a 15 week season. Throw in the need for breaks, then breaks for the Bowls or a playoff, and you could be talking about a season that begins in early to mid August (before classes commence) and could go to mid-January. Unless teams played two games a week. But how could you get people in the stands during the middle of the week?

Seems impractical.

If playoffs came about, there would be a push to have only 11-game seasons max. Such an alignment exceeding 12 is not practical in such a circumstance.

Sports -

Since the NCAA already allows an extra game for conferences with 12 or more teams, what if the NCAA allowed conferences with 15 or more teams to have a semifinal and final game to determine the champion.

What do you consider to be enough round robin play? Take the SEC, currently, 12 team conferences play 8 conference games - 5 in the same division, 3 out of division with 1 team being a permanent opponent. South Carolina always plays Arkansas (Alabama-UT, etc, etc). I assume you play the remaining 5 teams in the other division every 2.5 years (2 then 2 then the remaining 1 team in year 3)?

If you went to 15 with three 5 team divisions. You would play each team in your division - 4 games. That leaves 4 games for 12 teams. You would play all of them over a 3 year period which is close to the 12 team conference.

If you went to 16 teams with four 4 team divisions. You would play 3 games then have 11 game remaining with 5 conference games left. You could do that in almost 2 years with one oppoent left over.

This can all be done with an 11 game ´regular´ season (or even 12). The conference winners would play +1 or +2 depending on how far they advanced (not including the bowl game). Since the NCAA already allows an extra game if you play in Hawaii, it doesn´t seem that bad.

I´m not asking whether the conference would be practical per se, just whether the extra game would be worthwhile financially for conferences to increase from 12 to 15 or 16 games.

I don´t know how many people thought the 12 team conference could work until the SEC and Big12 showed how much money could be made with that many teams. Other conferences have followed in hopes of gaining that same financial windfall.

I think it would be better if conferences went to 9 teams (or 8) if there would be a ´true´ FB playoff, however, unless an act of Congress comes about it won´t happen.

Enough that you have played every conference member at least twice in a 4 year period. This can not happen under a 11-game schedule or even a 12-game schedule. Your concept doesn't allow for it with 15 or 16 members.




Are you familiar with how the Big 12 round robin works? You play half of the teams in the other division for two consecutive years with a home and home arrangement. Then the next two years of a four year period, you play a home and home series with the other three.

So, for instance, take Nebraska this year, as they begin 1st year of a two year cycle with the South Division members. Nebraska of course plays Colorado, Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State, and Missouri every year.

This year and next year they will be playing the following teams of the south division:

Baylor (home)
Oklahoma (away)
Texas Tech (away)

in 2005 they play these same three schools only reverse the homes and aways.

In 2006 and 2007 they switch to the other 3 teams of the south:

Oklahoma State
Texas
Texas A & M

It takes a 4-year cycle to get through this, that would allow teams to play on each other field through a cycle. Any more teams in the membership would cut down on the frequency that they play.

The SEC is similar, but they have all 5 other division opponents they play every year plus 1 permanent opponent from the other division and they rotate around the other 5 other divisional opponents. This is a similar concept for the ACC.

Your 15 or 16 member concept takes the frequency out. The other problem is that your playoff model would require the need for wild-cards in addition to divisional winners. The more divisional winners and the possibility of having teams with better records in other division creates inequity across the conference membership in a season where a 2nd place team may have a better conference record than a divisional winner, but yet couldn't go to the conference playoff. The 15-team, 3 division model would require 2 wildcards to make it fair and equtable, and the 16-team 4 divisional concept would require 1 to 2 wildcards. This is the same reason why the NFL has wild cards. If you could remember back to when it was 14 teams in each conferenc and two wild cards. Now its 16 teams, 4 divisions and 2 wild-cards. Reason: to overcome in inequities between divisional champions overall conference records and 2nd place finishers in other divisions.

That a complicated playoff for crowing a conference champion and throw in national post season play.

Thats why having only two divisions and 12 teams is the most simpliest and workable model with 11 or 12 game seasons. Now if the NCAA would allow for 13 or 14 game season in addition to conference playoffs and National post seasons, and allow for football practice to begin in the middle of July and football season starts August 12th, this would work.

I don't see that as practical. Its like they say. K.I.S.S. -- Keep it Simple and Sweet.

The best scenerio as you said is with the Big12. But with the SEC and ACC, since they have to play 1 permanent oppoent from the other division, you are left with play ALL other divisional opponents once EVERY THREE years, not two years as in the Big12. The three year ´schedule´ can also be achieved with a 15 team alignment IF NECESSARY (like the ACC and SEC).




This happens right now. Consider a situation in the SEC when UT, UGA, and UF could have better records than someone in the SEC west (when the west teams are down). Is it fair that UT, UGA or UF would have say 7-1 or 6-2 SEC records when the SEC west Champion is 5-3?

What about the situation where say LSU is 5-0 in its division but has games against the SEC east and goes 1-2 (their oppoents were UGA, UT, and Vandy, for example). Then, Auburn loses to LSU head to head, at Auburn, but Auburn goes 3-0 against the SEC east playing the 3 ´bottom´ opponents Kentucky, South Carolina, and Vandy. Is that really fair that LSU wins its division head to head, but loses more out of division games because it´s against tougher competition? In this scenerio, auburn goes to the championship, is that Fair?

Once you get beyond 9 team conferences you no longer can declare a true champion (see OSU and Iowa a few years ago). Conferences seem to be ok with these situations because money is there to overcome this aspect of college FB.




Not necessary. With 15 teams, you would only have to have 1 wildcard, like baseball. take the best 2nd place team. For 16 teams, you just take all four division champs. Someone has the possibility to get screwed no matter what. IT happens right now in the conferences with more than 9 teams since they don´t play a round-robin schedule.


You are looking at it from a pratical point of view. I´m saying it ´might´ be pratical, but conferences will only look at changing if the money is there.

The point of this is that if the SEC or other conferences were to expand to 15, the 3 teams would need to bring in $30 million to maintain a payout of $10 per team. That might be hard to do just with bringing in new markets since the SEC already has a championship game. However, if you add (AND the NCAA ALLOWS!) semifinal games for conferences having more than 14 teams, would they now make enough money to expand?

I dont know how much money the conference championship brings, but I´ll guess around $12 mill or $1 mill per team (IIRC from the ACC). If the semifinals were worth $5-8 mill, that means that 3 teams would only need to to bring in $22-$25 million. In addition, would the championship game go up or down in rights fees?

I´m not sure whether it would be economically feasible for conferences to expand even if you add semifinal games.

The best comparable to this is simply the old WAC-16 foible. The created quadrants. When you fragment long-term alignments in more ways than two separate divisions, you fragment too many traditional rivalries and series than too many of the teams separated wouldn't be happy. Its one serious catastrophy to fragement Oklahoma-Nebraska. But if you fragment Nebraska-Missouri or Nebraska-Colorado, depending on the alignment, you will get too many complaints. It would take too much traditional meaning away from the game. Example 2, breaking up LSU vs. Alabama to once every three years is too fragmented, just so LSU could be in a division with Ole Miss, MSU and Arkansas. Some of the major rivalries would be too fragmented in frequency that you wouldn't make anyone happy -- which is beyond the fragmentation problems that already happens beyond a two divisional line-up. Under such a scenario, these 1-opposite-divisional member you play every year wouldn't happen. Same with 5 members, but the problem would be even more complex difficulties with splitting two teams located in one state in two separate division. There's more chances with that with more than 2 divisions.




Yes, but there are greater chances of more inequities when you go beyond two divisions. There could be two teams with 1 or 2 losses in 2 of the divisions, while a third or fourth division winner has 3 losses. Too many chances for inequities. The two divisions provide for this, but they reduce the number of inequities when compared to 3 or 4 divisions.




^Again, see above. More chances for inequities causes a need for as many wild-cards as possible. In a 15-team arrangement you could theoretically go with no wild cards. The highest seed of the 3 divisional winners could get a bye into the championship game. Here is a serious problem if there are ineguities.

To give the 3 divisional winners byes is something that should be done in a conference championship playoff, so it rewards them for winning the division. Two wildcards allow for 3 teams to have byes, as the two wildcards would play-in to play a divisional winner.

Pro football has to have more wildcards because there are more chances for inequities when you play fewer games. If you play several several games in a season like the MLB, there's a greater separation of the teams -- less chances teams will be tied, the long season with many games reduces inequities. So they could go with only 1 wild card.




Not only is it impractical, it fragments the conferences, its too many interruptions in long traditional rivalries and series (foible of the WAC-16 quadrants). It also requires more games to settle a conference champion in already a tight season. The year would need to be extended, even if they stuck with 11 or 12 game seasons.




The problem is that there could be a point where the economies-of-scale would be maxed-out and the law of dimnishing returns would kick in with so much conference championship playoff games. If 3 or 4 or 6 conferences did this, or 10 conferences, so many conference playoff games that less and less of a TV share would be watching as it would overcrowd the cable networks, that you might not pick up much by playing conference championship playoffs. A lot of the character of the game would diminish and too many inequities unless you had enough wild cards and enough room to play them -- in addition to overcrowding the season.

If the season is to extend, its more likely to extend for a college football national championship or a playoff. If University Presidents have a problem with a national championship playoff, they will have even more of a problem with this.

College football is not pro football where one creates the World Championship by having a complex playoff in a conference structure, especially when there is 4 or 5 ot 6 conferences or more.

Its also not NCAA college basketball, as to schedule and play games with more frequency (multiple times in a week) make conference and national championships possible. Football is bigger, longer playing, more people in the stands, more players, more equipment, and more physical (more injuries) for a longer season that cummulatively make multiple layers and lengths of postseason and conference championships to not be possible or feasible.

Sports -

We´ll have to agree to disagree here. Many conferences already have forgone some traditional games in favor of gaining more money (it is their right, or course)

I would argue that 12 is already too many in FB.
I agree that going to 15 (or even 16) would be worse.
However, conferences have found an economic model that works for them that can make them more money than conferences with just 9 or 10. If the NCAA allowed semifinals in conferences with 15 or more teams, you ´might´ see this happen. Who knows?

I agree with you and would also be willing to bet that the NCAA won´t allow it (Is it the presidents that vote on these matters or do they only receive a recommendation). Maybe it will be a Division 2 or Div II conference that will get this to happen like the PSAC. Again, who knows?

However, this whole scenerio is of course pure speculation.

Yes, some conferences have fragmented a handful of rivalries. But not to the point of shattered identity and tradition of a conference core.

Its how you assemble the division. You allow in so many new teams that a team's new division has a lot less significance playing those teams, and most of their conference rivals are located in another division, and they play them once every three years. Fragmented traditional rivalries and series.

I think one of the problems with so many conference championship games is that if you don't have a large national audience (regionally televised) and more than one playoff or championship game is played on different networks at the same time, the economies-of-scale of playing such a game is reduced and the law of dminishing returns kicks in when there are several of these games happening simulaneously and you don't have a national audience.

NCAA votes for 12 game schedule in january

Bowls already tend to punish the loser of a conference championship game, because that team's fans tend NOT to travel to both the conference championship game and the bowl game in the same season. If you play a semifinal somewhere other than a non-neutral campus site, you'll compound those problems.

Given that economic structure, I suspect a serious diminishing returns effect- I think $5 million is very optimistic for such games.

Moreover... if you're in the Big 12 North, you still want to make as many visits to Texas as is humanly possible. ACC and SEC want to visit Florida. Pac-10 schools must visit Southern California. Recruiting, recruiting, recruiting. Dilute that, and you'll have a serious problem on your hands. Besides, everyone in the Big 12 wants a Nebraska GATE, Washington wants to act like the USC game is a bigger rivalry than, say, Oregon... almost every conference has certain schools that sell out any stadium. The act of increasing conference size, unless we're talking superconference (the haves stealing from the other haves), is a financial bust to the schools involved. That's the main reason why this is a non-starter.

Just as an aside, I don't buy geog's fairness doctrine. Fairness by the trend of his comments means drafting players rather than "free agent" signings to letters of intent. That's not about to happen.

They figured out how to squeeze another bowl into an exclusive time slot. It is pretty easy to add exclusive time slots for championship games.
ACC, Big 12, SEC on the first week in December.
Pac 10, Big 10, + 1 other on the Saturday after Thanksgiving (neither conference has a tradition of Thanksgiving weekend games).
MAC first Friday in December.
MWC Friday night after Thanksgiving.

That's 8 exclusive time slots for championship games and there are only enough I-A schools for 9 conferences of 12 teams (9X12=108 + 11 others=119 total counting FIU and FAU). And you could do an early morning start on one of the Saturdays, but that would not be good for attendance. An alternative would be regional coverage and/or ESPN/ESPN2 coverage for one of the time slots (for example MAC in midwest, CUSA in south).

Not true on the Pac10. Arizona plays Arizona State traditionally on Thanksgiving weekend.

Moved to BCS Banter Forum: 1/4/2004

_________________


@ncaasports csi.com/facebook


Like the new CSI Userbar? Feel free to use it here and any other forums.
You can save and host it yourself or link from here.