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Tuesday, March 19
The Indiana Daily Student

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COLUMN: In defense of Mike Leach and expanding the College Football Playoff

SPORTS FBC-FLORIDA-POTENTIALCOACHES 5 SE

With consecutive wins against a pair of ranked conference opponents, the Washington State Cougars have moved up the Pac-12 rankings to the number one spot in the north division. 

Washington State Coach Mike Leach has put together one of the better teams in program history. Washington State’s only loss was by three points on the road at Southern California. The Cougars are also in the mix of the College Football Playoff after being ranked No. 8 in the country earlier this week.

Like last year’s undefeated Central Florida team, Washington State could win the rest of its games only to get the short end of the stick by the College Football Playoff selection committee on Dec. 2, when the four-team playoff is named.

Leach’s squad is positioned to remain in playoff contention over the next month, but the seasoned head coach has doubts about the sport's current championship format.

“I think they need to expand the playoff system,” Leach said last week on former Louisiana State coach Les Miles’ podcast Les is More. “I think the minimum should be 16 teams, but they could easily go with more than that.”

Leach has been a proponent of expanding the playoff field from its current four-team setup. Three years ago during an interview with ESPN, the Washington State coach advocated for a 64-team, March Madness-style tournament.

While Leach’s original proposal has a few logistical hiccups with travel, his latest suggestion is realistic. The best part about the plan is the NCAA wouldn’t have to sacrifice any bowl games for it to come to fruition.

If anything is definitive here, it’s that the current system is bad. 

A four-team field creates too much controversy and sets standards way too high for the numerous title-contending teams in the country behind powerhouses Alabama and Clemson.

As long as Nick Saban and Dabo Swinney stay put, the Crimson Tide and Tigers will be making routine visits to the College Football Playoff. Their recruiting, development and coaching staff produce title-contending rosters yearly.

After an undefeated Alabama team lost by seven to Ohio State in the national semifinals in 2014 in the first year of the College Football Playoff, Alabama and Clemson have both gone on to appear in the next three playoffs.

Sure enough, it’s week 10 of the college football season and Alabama and Clemson are the only two teams receiving votes for the No. 1 spot in both major polls.

The top two teams in the country have a clear path to their fifth and fourth consecutive playoff appearances.

This leaves room for two more teams, likely some combination of the winners of the Big Ten, Big 12 or Pac 12. Central Florida and Notre Dame are also in play for a bid, but they’d have to win out convincingly for the committee to act in their favor.

It’s so difficult to rank the teams on the bubble for the two final spots because there are so many of them.

Aren’t we just limiting ourselves with the current playoff format? It would be way more interesting to see the top 16 teams in the country go at it during bowl season.

The champion of each power-five conference would receive an automatic bid into the playoff. The Sunday of conference championship weekend, the committee would rank the five power-five champs at the top of their rankings.

The next 11 teams would make up the at-large bids selected by the committee.

The round of 16 games would take place during prime-time slots for the first week of bowl season. The field would be cut in half each week and then there would be a bye week, as always, before the championship game. The quarterfinals, semifinals and finals would all double as major bowls that would rotate each year.

If the NCAA makes this happen, it is setting itself up for success. With 12 more teams involved, that’s 12 more fanbases invested in the playoff.

Revenue would be at least as much as the current system generates, but the fans would have a higher approval rating of the NCAA due to the move.

Ultimately, this action probably won’t be taken, at least not anytime soon. 

The current system is too young, in its fifth year, for there to be any serious talk about change. There’s hope for future reform, but it’s mostly frustration with today’s format.

Leach made sense of that frustration when he concluded his rant on the podcast.

“In other words, I want to see more football,” Leach said. “Everybody from rec league softball on down can figure out how to put together a tournament and yet Division 1 can’t.”

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