With the conclusion of the 2013 FBS/NCAA college football season complete, now is the time to announce the fictional field of 16 based upon my research and findings. I know many of you will have issues with how I seeded the field of 16, but please remember the professional model theory, which I used as a basis to seed the field of 16. On a side note, I have been asked by twitter followers; if the 4 team playoff were to start this season, which 4 teams do I think would make the field? After reviewing the pool of FBS/NCAA teams that I believe would be considered and to narrow that field down to just four, my (4) teams would be in no seed order: Florida State, Ohio State, Northern Illinois and Auburn. Teams on the outside looking in: Michigan State, Stanford, Central Florida and Alabama; maybe in that order. That’s just my opinion.
Now to the field of 16. First off remember I do not include conference championship games as part of the regular season. The regular season ends after 12 games. Only 12.8% of the FBS/NCAA football programs compete in a 13th game, those primarily being conference championship games along with Hawaii usually invites an FBS program out at the end of the season for a 13th game in December. What a 13th game on your FBS schedule prior to final exam week a weekend or couple of days in Hawaii. SIGN ME UP!!!. Since ALL of the FBS/NCAA programs do not play or schedule a contractually obligated 13th regular season game or ALL conferences possess a conference championship; then those 13th games cannot be factored in. Conference championship games are earned, not scheduled. For those SEC fans and 30+ Million college football fans, ask yourself this, when the 2013 FBS/NCAA football season schedules were announced, finalized, published, viewable on the World Wide Web in late spring or early summer of 2013; look at the end of your teams or various teams schedule? Someone please tell me or show me who scheduled, meaning those teams have a contractual obligation to play, not forecasting, the conference championship game and whose schedule shows which bowl game they are going to participate in? What many of you fail to comprehend is the conference championship game and bowl games are earned extra games, not automatically scheduled. In addition to that previous comment, MANY college football fans, audience, sports reporters and the Expert Sports Programming network fail to comprehend is that the BCS computerized system accounts for the 13th game for those who played a 13th game but possess a negative factor or accountability to those NCAA/FBS programs who do not play a 13th game to counteract the data and not skew the numbers. If I remember my math and statistical analysis from my Master class, uneven data when comparing 2 teams or a group of teams and data makes for a non-interpretive information.13 does not equal 12, a.k.a conference championship games being the 13th game and the regular season ending with a 12th game.
Yes, there were some great, exciting and upset conference championship games yesterday from what I could view, while I was on break at work yesterday during my 16 hours, but I cannot factor those results into my fictional field of 16 based upon research and historical factors. And now for the selection, seeds and where the big games will be played.
Better seeded teams host 1st round games because they EARNED it, after that its all neutral bowl game sites.
GROUP A (First Round) 1st weekend in December
#1 Northern Illinois (12-0) vs. #16 Oregon (10-2)-winner advances to the New Mexico Bowl
#8 Auburn (11-1) vs. #9 Alabama (11-1) (Rematch 1)-winner advances to New Mexico Bowl
#5 Louisville (11-1) vs. #12 Oklahoma State (10-2)-winner advances to Idaho Potato Bowl
#4 Central Florida (11-1) vs. #13 South Carolina (10-2) (Rematch 2)-winner advances to Idaho Potato Bowl
GROUP B
#3 Florida State (12-0) vs. #14 Ball State (10-2)-winner advances to Poinsetta Bowl
#6 Missouri (11-1) vs. #11 Fresno State (10-1)-winner advances to Poinsetta Bowl
#7 Michigan State (11-1) vs. #10 Baylor (11-1)-winner advances Beef O Brady Bowl
#2 Ohio State (12-0) vs. #15 Stanford (10-2)-winner advances to Beef O Brady Bowl
Second week of December off for final exam week.
Round 2 Bowl Games played 3rd weekend of December like they are usually.
Group A
Winner from #1 and #16 vs. Winner from #8 and #9 in the New Mexico Bowl- winner advances to the Rose Bowl
Winner from #5 and #12 vs. Winner from #4 and #13 in the Idaho Potato Bowl- winner advances to the Rose Bowl
Group B
Winner from #3 and #14 vs. winner from #6 and #11 in the Poinsetta Bowl- winner advances to the Fiesta Bowl
Winner from #7 and #10 vs. winner from #2 and #15 in the Beef O Brady Bowl- winner advances to Fiesta Bowl
Rose Bowl and Fiesta Bowl played on the same day on New Years Day.
NCAA/FBS College Football Championship Game played 7 days later in the Orange Bowl with the 2 remaining programs.
If you break down my brackets this is how the data looks:
13 NCAA/BCS/AQ programs were selected and 3 NCAA/NON-BCS/NON-AQ programs were selected. All 125 FBS/NCAA programs have an equal opportunity to make the field of 16, with the exception of those FBS/NCAA programs placed on probation by the NCAA for rules violations and completion of their investigation.
ALL 0-loss and 1-loss teams made the field and only (35) of the (8) 2-loss teams were selected and the remaining (3) were considered but on the outside looking in (Clemson, Duke and Arizona State). Sounds familiar, better get use to it next year.
Conference representation and well balanced.
SEC received 4: Auburn, Alabama, Missouri and South Carolina
Big 10 received 2: Ohio State and Michigan State
Big 12 received 2: Baylor and Oklahoma State
PAC 12 received 2: Stanford and Oregon
American received 2: Central Florida and Louisville
MAC received 2: Northern Illinois and Ball State
ACC received 1: Florida State
Mountain West received 1: Fresno State
8 of the 10 conference were represented. Only the Sun Belt and Conference USA were not selected. Closets teams from those (2) conferences to be considered were Rice at (9-3) and Louisiana Lafayette at (8-4).
Imagine if this were true……..and reality…..the fun we would have watching college football for 5+ weeks.
Please be respectful of my selections, because this time next year, you the fans and the college football audience are relying on an very in-experienced group of 13 to select 3.1% of the field and some programs will be on the outside looking in. I respect that many of you may have issue with, dislike, difference of opinions on the how I seeded the field of 16, remember this is FICTIONAL, based upon my experience of reviewing thousands upon thousands of data points. At least I am fair and honest with my selection and on one paid me $$, called me on the phone, sent me an email to consider or lobby for their FBS/NCAA program over another. This is totally un-biased. This could be a possibility in the future for college football. I could also sense that all of you would agree that this is a great field of 16 and the FBS teams I left on the outside looking in you would agree with. This type of college football playoff format would more than make college football in December and through the New Year, VERY enjoyable to watch and root for some great games and or even rematches. I did a selection process in only hours today, in which the future college football playoff committee will take days to complete, debate and publish. I even published this before ESPN could have their selection show.
If you have any questions or would like to pick who would advance, please tweet me @cfbpoexpert or leave a comment.