Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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www.BLUEANDGOLD.com AUGUST 2021 7 FAN FORUM On June 10, a College Football Playoff working group — which included Notre Dame director of athletics Jack Swarbrick — announced a proposal to change the current four-team format to a 12-team event. The proposal calls for the bracket each year to include the six highest- ranked conference champions, plus the six highest-ranked remaining teams as determined by the CFP selection committee. No conference would qualify automatically and there would be no limit on the number of participants from a league. The four highest-ranked conference champions would be seeded one through four and each would receive a first-round bye, while teams seeded five through 12 would play each other in the first round on the home field of the higher-ranked team. Under the proposal, the quarterfinals and semifinals would be played in bowl games, and the championship game would continue to be at a neutral site. T h e a n n o u n c e m e n t sparked a healthy debate on the BlueandGold.com message board on whether or not this was a good de- velopment for Notre Dame. Here is a sampling of what some of our members had to say: FWCOACH: Could some- one explain to me how this does not destroy what was the best regular season in all of sports? Crash_Davis_8: The de- struction started when the BCS was formed. Once there was only two teams playing for a national championship on New Year's Day, it was only a matter of time before all the other bowl games be- came true exhibitions. sjb75: The 12 to now 14 team NFL playoffs annually are better than what CFB offers. It's a win for Notre Dame and CFB, more CFB games will matter going into late October and November, even if the parity that the NFL achieves does not exist in CFB. irishvan: Why in the world would it destruct anything? It makes it more exciting for most fans including ND fans who now have a greater likelihood of getting invited to a dance of 12 rather than 4. Every game will matter both to get an invite and for seeding which will be gigantic. It is a win and I am missing the negative. Go Irish! Kcndmis97: I have to disagree and say this is an overall net negative for ND from a pure football perspective. SBC Nation: With this setup, ND will be in the playoffs 50% more than they'd be with an 8 team playoff and auto-bids. That's a win in terms of enjoy- ing the excitement of the playoff. The trade-off is that I now don't envision a title in my lifetime. The get-an-elite-QB and catch lightning in a bottle for two games is toast. Your program has to be a mirror image of Clemson or Bama in every way, not just better than Oregon, Texas A&M, etc. apegambino: For almost my entire life I've been against ND joining a confer- ence, but now I'm to the point ND just needs to do themselves a favor and join up and automatically get an even playing field. ccc90: The point is this makes it much harder for ND to win championships. The lack of a bye when they are worthy of a top 4 seed is a big negative. I'm fine with 12 teams and more access, etc. With the way this is tilted against ND, I think Swarbrick failed big time. It's almost impossible to believe he agreed to this. The 13th data point card never carried any weight. Yet Swarbrick folded like a cheap suit anyways. A dereliction of duty and I just cannot believe he agreed to this. Nor can anyone I have talked to over the last two days. cmck: I think the BCS gave ND a decent shot at a title path. Playoffs made that remote. 12 teams and it becomes very remote. mh2365: With the bye argument … the bottom line is it comes down to do you want to be inde- pendent or do you want to join a conference? We have a bye already by not having to play a conference champion- ship game. I have no issues with not being eligible for a top 4 spot because I don't want to join a conference. PreTill1: ND fans can't have their cake and eat it, too. If you want a top 4 seed join a confer- ence. If you want to stay independent, then play 12 games and take your bye week a week before the other 4 teams do. It's silly to ask to only play 12 games AND get an extra bye week. simmer007: This en- sures that ND will never win another national title. Tomas8660: While it would be easier for ND to reach the championship game as a 1-4 seed, the pros outweigh the cons. There are two scenarios that I see. Scenario 1: ND joins a conference. Let's just say it's the ACC. On top of likely eliminating rivalry games against USC and Stanford they also would have a 13th game (conference championship), likely against Clemson. No reason to not project Clemson as a perennial 1-4 seed. If ND goes undefeated but loses in the conference championship they would have a 14th game in the first round and, unless the loss was close, they're seeded lower than 5 and would have a matchup against a 1-3 seed in the second round. Tough sledding. Scenario 2: ND stays independent. They keep their rivalry games, go unde- feated in the regular season, and the 13th game is now against a 12 seed. A win there gets them a second-round matchup against the lowest-ranked team with a bye. As you stated above, that might be a team that would otherwise be a 5 seed or lower. This seems like a much easier path. FROM THE WEB JOIN THE CONVERSATION! GET A 60-DAY FREE TRIAL WITH CODE IRISH60 Some Fighting Irish fans believe the proposed 12-team format for the College Football Playoff will make it very difficult for Notre Dame to knock off top programs like Alabama and end its national title drought. PHOTO COURTESY COLLEGE FOOTBALL PLAYOFF