2024 college football offseason thread

So, 15 NCAA tournament bids next year, right?

 

You'd have to blow up a lot of decent rivalries, right? Tennessee couldn't play Bama all the time, for example.

 

It's similar to interleague play that everyone was excited about when MLB started it, but really Reds vs. Blue Jays does nothing for me. But I am glad some players get a shot to play at Wrigley and Fenway. Still not as good as a season-long feud between division rivals.

 

Yeah, the quads plan would be it. You go with four, four-team divisions with a nine-game conference schedule.
You play every team in your division (three games) every year, a full set from another division (four more games), and then one more from another division. The non-division opponents would rotate every year. So Division A would play Division B in 2024, Division C in 2025, and Division D in 2026. That way you see every team at least once every three years and play them at home no less than once every six years. You can reserve the eighth game for a non-division rivalry that doesn't line up with the rotation, and rotate it around in years that it does. So if Alabama and Tennessee wind up in Division B and C, you can have them paired for that eighth game and then give them someone else in the years where B and C play each other.

The ninth conference game would be the conference semifinals for the division winners, and a bonus game for the rest of the league. Whoever doesn't make the conference playoffs gets paired up with another team at the same level to help them either reach bowl eligibility or improve their playoff standing. You can assign home games for that week before the season begins so that half the league plays at home one year and the other half the next.
Some smaller leagues have done something similar for basketball, where they have the last four or five games as TBA and then pair them up based on record to help improve their NCAA Tournament prospects.

It might be a little clunky. I'm sure there would be kinks to work out and reasons it might not work. It just always seemed like a logical solution to me. It helps the scheduling problem, doesn't completely dismantle rivalries (you might skip one in a given season, but you're still seeing people on a regular basis), and it adds a layer of excitement with the conference semifinals and bonus game.

 

Give The People What They Want.

 

Wait till a contending SEC team misses out on a home playoff game and has to play on the road because playing Mercer dropped their SOS.

 

Wait until people notice that the sainted Big 10 is taking a break from Sex Crime Derby long enough to play a half-dozen FCS schools in Week 1 alone.

 

Well they can't get them in week 11 because they're booked up with the SEC, and the Big Ten is playing conference games.

 

Ah yes, those mighty Big 10 clashes the weekend before Thanksgiving. Let’s look at who the top third of the league will be playing then:

1. Ohio State Buckeyes - vs Indiana
2. Oregon Ducks - Open
3. Penn State Nittany Lions - at Minnesota
4. Michigan Wolverines - vs Northwestern
5. Iowa Hawkeyes - at Maryland
6. USC Trojans - at UCLA

 

With the exception of Iowa-Maryland, all these games are longstanding conference rivalries, and in the case of USC-UCLA, an iconic rivalry.

 

Yes, and the lines on all of them will be two touchdowns or greater. (maybe not Iowa since they’ll price in a 9-0 victory)