(12-18-2018 03:46 PM)TerryD Wrote:  

(12-18-2018 02:32 PM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(12-18-2018 01:59 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

Quote:Northwestern athletic director Jim Phillips said... “We don’t think that conference champions have been properly respected as intended by the founders of the Playoff system."

That struck me as a strange thing to say. I mean, if we look at the 20 teams that have made the playoffs in the five years of the CFP, fully 17 of them have been conference champions. Only three teams have made the playoffs without being a conference champ.

And of those three, only 1 should be of concern to the B1G. Ohio State in 2016 shouldn't because well, they are a B1G team, so the B1G got a team in anyway.

Also this year, Notre Dame got in, but clearly, the founders of the CFP did not intend for the CFP to be biased against Notre Dame, as they aren't in a conference. Notre Dame didn't win a conference but they didn't lose one either.

The only real situation that should irk the B1G was Alabama getting in over Ohio State in 2017. That was a raw case of a non-champ getting in over a champ. But, that's 1 time out 20, and the founders of the CFP envisioned that this could possible happen.

So .... not sure what the gripe is?

Me neither. Did he gripe when non conference champ Ohio State made the playoffs in 2016?

Between him, Alvarez, and Delany, I conclude that this is just arse-hurt on the B1G's part. One thing that has been clear is that with regard to conference prestige, the CFP is a different animal from the BCS. With the BCS, because there were only two teams, it was math that the majority of AQ/Power conferences would be left out in any given year, so if your conference was left out, it wasn't a big embarrassment, you had plenty of company.

But now with 4 teams, missing out is much more glaring. We saw that immediately, in 2014, when the Big 12 was shut out of the playoffs. As the only kid who didn't get a lollipop from the CFP, the Big 12 was immediately singled out as inferior, and they responded quickly to put in place a CCG so as to boost their chances. A fear of being regularly left out of the playoffs also motivated them to explore expanding.

The B1G is feeling that now. Two years in a row outside the playoffs has the B1G feeling stigmatized as inferior, and they don't like it. It's hurting them in the media, and heck probably on the recruiting trail - i can just see Brian Kelly's staff talking right now to recruits in Ohio and Michigan about how if you want to make the playoffs, the B1G isn't for you.

The other day, Delany did say they might explore dissolving their divisions and doing their CCG like the Big 12 does so as to guarantee high-ranked teams in the CCG. But now, they are talking expansion of playoffs.

That's easier to talk about, because it puts the blame for B1G failure on "the system", not themselves. It's not that we (the B1G) isn't good enough, the system is failing!

Not very sporting, because as I noted, when the Big 12 faced that problem, they didn't blame they system they made structural changes to improve their situation. We saw that in other sports too - in 2016 after the SEC got just 3 teams in the hoops tournament, they didn't blame they system, they started scheduling better OOC so as to improve their conference RPI.

But the B1G seems to want a bailout ....