A conference silver medal became the golden ticket with this College Football Playoff selection committee.
The playoff committee’s bracket choices Sunday in this inaugural 12-team field devalued the reward for winning a conference title by protecting teams that lost in conference championship games.
Confused? So am I.
Let’s start with the most-puzzling presentation in the bracket: The committee awarded the No. 11 seed to SMU (11-2), the ACC’s runner-up that owns no marquee victories. The committee clearly valued SMU’s 11 victories compared to teams left out of the field like Alabama (9-3) and Mississippi (9-3), which compiled inferior records against a tougher schedule.
I might disagree with that rationale, but I understand it. What I can’t comprehend is why SMU received a better seed than 12th-seeded Clemson, the ACC’s champion that beat SMU on a neutral field less than 12 hours before the bracket reveal.
Clemson (10-3) snatched a playoff auto bid thanks to that victory, but despite playing a tougher schedule than SMU and beating the Mustangs in what had been billed as a high-stakes game, the committee bizarrely seeded the ACC’s champion behind the conference’s silver medalist.
It’s as if committee members fell asleep before Clemson won with a last-second field goal to beat SMU 34-31.
Respect for conference title losers goes beyond SMU
Elsewhere in the bracket, you’ll find more supreme valuation of conference runners-up. Texas and Penn State lost their respective conference championship games but earned the Nos. 5 and 6 seeds, respectively, the highest seeds available to at-large qualifiers.
Those seeds are particularly valuable within this bracket format, because it guarantees Texas and Penn State won’t face either of the playoff’s top two seeds, Oregon and Georgia, sooner than the semifinals.
Texas could coast into the semifinals without beating a top-10 team.
The committee seeded Penn State two spots ahead of eighth-seeded Ohio State after the Buckeyes beat Penn State in Happy Valley just more than a month ago. While Penn State enjoys arguably the most ideal placement in the bracket – it opens against SMU – the Buckeyes received one of the toughest draws. They’ll start by hosting Tennessee, and No. 1 Oregon awaits the winner.
The Nittany Lions own one extra victory than Ohio State, but they have the same number of losses. The Buckeyes beat two playoff teams, including – let’s reiterate – Penn State. The Nittany Lions beat no playoff teams and only one team in the CFP’s top 25. But, hey, they’ve got that Big Ten silver medal. That’s as good as gold.
If the committee had rejected SMU or penalized Penn State in the seeding, it would have signaled that conference championship results matter. As is, it’s as if SMU and Penn State lost in glorified exhibition games Saturday, and the committee deemed those results mostly meaningless.
CFP welcomes ACC runner-up, rejects Army, BYU, others
Much of the attention Sunday centered on whether the committee would choose Alabama or SMU for the final at-large spot. Let’s put aside for the moment Alabama, a team that lost to two 6-6 opponents, and look at Army.
If the committee were willing to embrace a team with a squishy strength of schedule to avoid selecting a three-loss team, why not choose the 11-1 Black Knights, who pummeled Tulane to win the AAC? Army’s only loss came against Notre Dame, a caliber of opponent SMU never faced.
If this had been an exercise of valuing conference champions, select Army. If it’s about valuing record, there again, Army looks good. Avoiding losses to bad teams? Army still looks good.
Don’t like Army’s strength of schedule? Understood. If strength of schedule rules, opt for Alabama or South Carolina.
Or, if impressive victories rule, choose Ole Miss, which smashed Georgia and South Carolina.
Value head-to-head results? OK, consider Brigham Young, a two-loss team that beat SMU in the Mustangs’ stadium in September and played a tougher schedule than SMU.
By embracing SMU, the committee went for none of those alternative ideas. Instead, when forced to make tough selection and seeding decisions, this committee chose a peculiar path and protected conference runners-up who didn’t get blown out. SMU, Penn State and Texas combined for six losses, the most lopsided of which was Texas’ 15-point regular-season loss to Georgia.
In contrast, Alabama suffered a blowout two weeks ago at Oklahoma. Adios, Alabama. South Carolina got trounced at home in October by Ole Miss. Bye-bye, Gamecocks, even though you beat Clemson one week before SMU lost. Clemson lost in a lopsided game to Georgia in the season opener. Enjoy that 12-seed, Tigers. And Army got whipped by Notre Dame, so the committee ignored the Black Knights’ conference title.
The case for SMU centered almost entirely around its 11 victories – a figure Army matched while playing one fewer game – and the Mustangs’ ACC red ribbon. By luck of the draw, SMU avoided Clemson, Miami and Syracuse during the regular season. Those three teams join SMU as the ACC’s only teams ranked inside this CFP top 25.
The 17-team ACC plays only eight conference games. SMU’s favorable schedule draw set it up for a runner-up finish that it parlayed into a sweet prize.
“It would be criminal if we are not in,” SMU’s Rhett Lashlee told reporters after losing to Clemson. “It would be wrong not just to our team but to what college football stands for.’
I understand Lashlee campaigning for his team, but I’m sorry, since when has college football stood for protecting the ACC’s runner-up?
Since Sunday.
Never in college football’s history has there been a better time to lose a conference championship game.
Blake Toppmeyer is the USA TODAY Network’s national college football columnist. Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on X @btoppmeyer. Subscribe to read all of his columns.
