DENNY O'BRIEN: Playoff would widen gap in Division I-A

College Notebook No. 15
Friday, November 18, 2005

By Denny O'Brien

PIRATE TALK

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Division I-A college football has the most intense playoff system in all of sports. It's called the regular season.

For 11 weeks, teams compete in a single-elimination format that produces two teams for a winner-take-all showdown to close the season. Stumble once, and talk of a national title won't resurface until the commencement of Spring ball.

At least that is one of the main goals behind the Bowl Championship Series. And for the most part it has worked, with this season being no exception.

That Alabama and Virginia Tech lost in consecutive weeks has given the BCS plenty of reason to breathe easy. Now all it needs is for Southern Cal and Texas to maintain a pulse and the season will end the way most expected — with the nation's two top teams slugging it out in the Rose Bowl.

No controversy. No coaches pleading their case to USA Today or Harris Poll voters who possess a large chunk of their fate.

"I think sooner or later, people are going to go there," Tulane president Scott Cowen said of a playoff. "I just think it's begging to go in that direction. Anything less than that, even if we drew a modified playoff, we're still going to say that's got problems with it.

"The other thing is, we (have a playoff) in Division I-AA. We do it in all other divisions. Now, what is different about Division I-A is the historic bowl system and bowl tie-ins. That's what makes it a little more complex."

No question. A playoff in Division I-A college football is as non-traditional as Oregon's florescent yellow uniforms.

That said, it's hard not to imagine the excitement a playoff would generate in a season that has produced the biggest resurgence of historical powers in recent memory. Penn State, Alabama, and Notre Dame have returned to the national spotlight, which no doubt has rekindled some interest among the sport's more casual observers.

Hey, who wouldn't want to see a playoff that included that menu of superpowers? Texas-El Paso, Texas Christian, and Fresno State fans — that's who.

Any true playoff system the powers that be might draft probably would exclude that trio, or any other program from a conference that currently doesn't have automatic access to a BCS game. The first step likely would include an eight-team configuration of programs which already own a free ticket to the big money bowls.

The end result is seven games that produce bigger buckets of Benjamins and a wider gap within Division I-A.

As it stands today, the national champion in Division I-A is little more than a figurehead. That has been the case historically, and it largely wasn't an issue until the inception of the BCS — the first legitimate attempt to organize a match-up of a true No.1 versus No.2.

If non-BCS league commissioners, school presidents, and coaches are smart, they will steer clear of any playoff push and continue to focus their energy on gaining better access to BCS games. Because the day the cartel schools do agree on a playoff is the day we witness an unofficial subdivision within Division I-A.

Rest assured any playoff that group designs will be self-serving and have a main premise that is underscored by generating more money for itself. That will ensure better facilities, more lucrative television contracts, and better recruits.

Meanwhile, leagues like Conference USA and the Mountain West Conference will be forced to settle for increasingly irrelevant postseason bowls. And in a playoff system, the leftover bowls will evolve into the equivalent of the pigskin NIT.

Now, all of this is null in void if the NCAA one day decides to seize control of the postseason in Division I-A football. The sport's sanctioning body no doubt would construct a more fair system that wouldn't close its doors due to league affiliation.

However, the NCAA has shown no signs or interest in governing the Division I-A postseason.

This is a clear case where the cart can't precede the horse. Before the decision-makers from the have-nots jump on the playoff bandwagon, they must first pursue better representation within the BCS.

In comparing the seasons of West Virginia, Fresno, TCU, and UTEP, that argument is gaining momentum. The debate can easily be made that the Bulldogs, Frogs, and Miners are just as deserving as the Mountaineers.