Penn State Sports Magazine
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1530530
J A N U A R Y 2 0 2 5 6 3 W W W . B L U E W H I T E O N L I N E . C O M time, the 1994 Nittany Lions were in danger of becoming his fourth unde- feated, uncrowned team. The second- ranked Lions were in their second year of Big Ten membership and were locked into a matchup against 12th- ranked Oregon in the Rose Bowl, while No. 1 Nebraska was in South Florida getting ready for a clash with No. 3 Mi- ami in the Orange Bowl. That the two best teams in the coun- try should find themselves on opposite sides of the continent in the final days of the season was yet more evidence for the argument Paterno had been trying to make. College football's top division needed to have a more sensible way to determine its champion. 'It's A Big Idea' It wasn't as if no one knew at the time how to conduct a championship tournament. In every other level of or- ganized football, from the PIAA to the NFL, there were systems in place to determine the best teams and pit them against each other in a slate of elimina- tion games conducted over a period of weeks. Even college football had play- offs in its lower divisions. Why should Division I-A be the lone exception? Paterno was pondering this question long before his team was dispatched to Pasadena in 1994. During the 1978 sea- son, he spoke in detail to Dave Kindred of The Washington Post about how a playoff might take shape. Paterno proposed a selection com- mittee made up of coaches and others who "knew college football." The com- mittee would meet to determine the top four teams after all the bowls had been played, and those teams would get matched up in the semifinals, with the winners facing off for the national championship. Also quoted in Kindred's story was Indiana's sixth-year coach, Lee Corso. The future ESPN commentator echoed Paterno's support for a playoff and thought that the championship game should be played the day before the Super Bowl. Some of Paterno's most interest- ing ideas involved what to do with the proceeds that the playoff was sure to generate. He speculated that the me- dia-rights revenue, ticket sales and concessions would add up to as much as $6 million per year and suggested that the money be put in an interest- bearing account overseen by a foun- dation. Once the account had grown sufficiently, the foundation could give low-interest loans to athletics depart- ments around the country to fund facilities projects or make other im- provements. "It's a big idea, sure," Paterno told Kindred. "It would take tremendous work to get it done. But I'm a little screwy. I hate whiners. I'm a guy who wants to do something about it. Use your brain, use your ingenuity." Paying The Price Paterno and Corso were hardly the only coaches who were advocating for a Division I-A playoff long before it arrived. Ohio State's Woody Hayes and Michigan State's Duffy Daugherty were among the early proponents of the idea, and Florida's Steve Spurrier was another prominent supporter. For many years, though, their big idea was a little too big for the people who wielded power in college football. Bowl organizers didn't want anything to do with it, for obvious reasons, and the conferences — particularly the Big Ten and Pac-10 — were reluctant to jeopardize their lucrative relationship with the bowls. Even among coaches, it was a divisive issue; some preferred the bowls because the chances of end- ing the season with a win were greater than in a playoff with only one winner. At his Rose Bowl presser in 1994, Paterno acknowledged that there was plenty of support for the status quo. He also conceded that his playoff advo- cacy might seem to some observers like the sound of a frustrated coach blowing off steam, but he noted that his support predated the team's Rose Bowl appear- ance by nearly three decades. "This isn't something I'm support- ing because this year we're undefeated and only ranked No. 2," he explained. "It's something I've stood for for close to 30 years. It's something college foot- ball needs. "In 1968 and 1969, I became more convinced than ever that a playoff was needed. We had undefeated teams both years, and I felt we were as good as any team in the country and never had a shot at the championship." In the end, Paterno's 1994 Nittany Lions paid the price for the Big Ten's playoff opposition. They defeated the Ducks, 38-20, to complete a 12-0 sea- son, becoming the first Big Ten team since Ohio State in 1968 to finish with a perfect record. And yet they ended up second in both polls to Nebraska, which beat Miami, 24-17, the night before. A year later, the Bowl Alliance was formed in hope of matching the na- tion's top two teams in a champion- ship game, and it was followed by the Bowl Championship Series. Those were tentative steps toward a real playoff, but Paterno wasn't satisfied with the two-team format and stopped voting in the BCS coaches' poll after the 2003 season. "Not that I'm against what other people want to do," he explained. "It's just that philosophically, I think you ought to win it on the field. If I have to vote for somebody only because people have said these are the two teams that ought to be in the BCS championship game and I think they left somebody out that probably ought to be in it, that's when I feel a playoff ought to be appropriate. I've always been for a playoff." ■ "I have always kind of resented the fact that we have had only two national champions. I like to think we had five. I think the 1968, 1969 and 1973 teams were worthy of national championships." J O E P A T E R N O