In reply to: It happens in every other NCAA sport as well as Pro. * posted by TWO
Partly because home field advantage incentivizes teams to give a shit late into the season, and partly because we're still only talking about 16 games each year.
I think you could preserve the meaning of the regular season by giving teams #1-4 a first-round game on campus.
This year, that would look like this:
- UCF @ Alabama
- Michigan @ Clemson
- Ohio State @ Notre Dame (actually, I don't love this for us)
- Georgia @ Oklahoma
I'm watching all of those games!
win or go home. It is March Madness in the fall. The final four is for all the marbles. Why change a great system?
Pre-season rankings artificially bolster--and punish--teams before the season even starts. Teams schedule their way to wins. Conferences vary dramatically in terms of quality. Some teams (like Northwestern this year) get super lucky with their conference schedules.
I don't disagree with your larger point, but there's too much variability in college football for me to buy in to your comparison to March Madness. At least the NCAA basketball tournament directors try to create "fair & balanced" brackets.