Trying to think of ways for G5 teams to get more quality wins. I am not in favor of the G5 playoff system in lieu of bowl games like some have suggested, because that pretty much admits defeat.

What if G5 conferences somehow shortened their season, and played their championship games a week earlier. Then the 2 highest rated G5 schools from separate conferences played each other for a G5 championship game. Giving an opportunity for another quality win for a school like UCF.

This year that would put UCF vs. Boise. I'm not saying this would be the answer, but could continue to help their chances. I think UCF biggest fallback was lack of quality wins in the P5. If they would have had a high quality win against a P5 school, say like a Miss. State, and then throw in a win like Boise, and being undefeated would have gotten them in.

Good idea but the NCAA rule is that there is a max of 12 regular season games plus a possible single conference championship game....all g5s would only be able to schedule 11 regular season games under your scenario to keep the option open for that last game even if it would be allowed without a full vote.

I'm not for this unless it creates an automatic bid for an expanded playoff. Otherwise, this further separates the Ps from the Gs. I saw a way preliminary top 25 on SBNation showing UCF as #21, by combining all early top 25 polls. This is setting the tone for next year's top 25 - from here on out, an undefeated G school will max out around #10 preventing them from getting anywhere near #4 because of "strength of schedule". The best G schools can do is schedule 4 P schools before conference season, hope they don't suck (like a Maryland, Purdue or Arkansas (not yourkansas)), and hope another team in your conference is undefeated when you play them so you can get another top 25 win in conference. G teams have to stuff the schedule and hope things fall their way to get into the the championship game without stumbling at all. Notice the stumble Oklahoma had vs. ISU and Clemson has vs. Syracuse. They were excused because OU and Clemson are P schools. If UC (or UCF) is undefeated and stumbles against a non-top 25 school, no way they get into the playoff, even if they have a stuffed schedule.

Sorry - went on a rant here and got way off topic but my first sentence is my response to this - a game of the best G schools would just show more separation between the Gs and the Ps. At that point, might as well just admit defeat and create a new division of college football if there is no benefit to playing this game. I'd be all for scheduling home and homes with the best G school annually though - Boise, San Diego State, Toledo, etc.

Unless there's a hardwired slot for a G5 in the playoffs, no amount of schedule manipulation, begging, pleading, appeals to fairness, or self-righteous anger will get one of them in. If they went to the holy grail of an 8 school playoff, it would just be 8 P5 schools in the playoffs.

Bad idea as all schools but 2 would lose 1/12th of ticket and TV. For you non financial types losing over 8% is huge.

Most G5 schools do not expect to contend for NC. Yes a handful think they could, UCF, USF, UH, Boise, UC, SDSU, etc. but the majority are stuck and accept it. We are in the group that aspire but likely that is where it ends.

(01-09-2018 09:12 AM)JackieTreehorn Wrote:  Unless there's a hardwired slot for a G5 in the playoffs, no amount of schedule manipulation, begging, pleading, appeals to fairness, or self-righteous anger will get one of them in. If they went to the holy grail of an 8 school playoff, it would just be 8 P5 schools in the playoffs.

...and look at this year's rankings - UCF wouldn't have even been if they went to 8.

(01-09-2018 09:54 AM)bearcatdp Wrote:  

(01-09-2018 09:12 AM)JackieTreehorn Wrote:  Unless there's a hardwired slot for a G5 in the playoffs, no amount of schedule manipulation, begging, pleading, appeals to fairness, or self-righteous anger will get one of them in. If they went to the holy grail of an 8 school playoff, it would just be 8 P5 schools in the playoffs.

...and look at this year's rankings - UCF wouldn't have even been if they went to 8.

Some feel they might have. There was a lot of smoke about keeping them extra low just in case there was a scenario where lots of the P5s lost and they were forced to keep moving UCF up in the polls and getting them too close to the top where they might be forced to seriously consider them. If they went to 8 teams, it would not be as big a deal and they would have had slots for the blue bloods still. Would they have been top 8, not sure, but I do think it would have been close. Probably would have come in at No. 9 just to keep them out.

How about a 6 team playoff?
5 conference champions and the best from G5 (UCF)
Win your conference and your in ~ nothing to complain about.
Top 2 teams get a bye week while 3 plays 6 and 4 plays 5.
System has to remove rankings and opinion polls.
Make it simple.

(01-09-2018 10:09 AM)ktny4 Wrote:  How about a 6 team playoff?
5 conference champions and the best from G5 (UCF)
Win your conference and your in ~ nothing to complain about.
Top 2 teams get a bye week while 3 plays 6 and 4 plays 5.
System has to remove rankings and opinion polls.
Make it simple.

Absolutely no way anyone agrees with the top 2 getting a BYE. Just go to 8. P5 Champs, Highest Ranked G5, 2 at large.

(01-09-2018 09:34 AM)doss2 Wrote:  Bad idea as all schools but 2 would lose 1/12th of ticket and TV. For you non financial types losing over 8% is huge.

I'm glad you broke it down for all of us non-financial types. All of this time I've literally been driving around throwing handfuls of $100 bills out of the window on my daily commute. Now that you've brought sense to me, I realize this is the reason why I'm losing so much money!

I don't see this as a solution. It would only widen the gap. You have to play the big boys game to play with the big boys.

I think what really needs to happen is instead of scheduling FBS schools, the AAC and other high-level G5 conferences need to create a scheduling alliance or rotating challenge (like with basketball) where the AAC, CUSA, MAC, and MW face-off against each other for one week. You can create incentive for the better teams by facing the #1 AAC team from the previous year against the #1 MW team, the #2 against #2, and so on. You can have the AAC - MW challenge one weekend where they can keep tally of the record VS the other conference.

Obviously the conferences have different numbers of teams and these would be scheduled on relatively short notice, but at least it's a partial solution and it doesn't necessarily cause the G5 to cannibalize each other.

(01-09-2018 10:20 AM)djtothemoney Wrote:  

(01-09-2018 10:09 AM)ktny4 Wrote:  How about a 6 team playoff?
5 conference champions and the best from G5 (UCF)
Win your conference and your in ~ nothing to complain about.
Top 2 teams get a bye week while 3 plays 6 and 4 plays 5.
System has to remove rankings and opinion polls.
Make it simple.

Absolutely no way anyone agrees with the top 2 getting a BYE. Just go to 8. P5 Champs, Highest Ranked G5, 2 at large.

Totally agree with this. This is the best option, unless the P schools decide to secede, which is a rumor as well.

(01-09-2018 10:58 AM)crex043 Wrote:  I don't see this as a solution. It would only widen the gap. You have to play the big boys game to play with the big boys.

I think what really needs to happen is instead of scheduling FBS schools, the AAC and other high-level G5 conferences need to create a scheduling alliance or rotating challenge (like with basketball) where the AAC, CUSA, MAC, and MW face-off against each other for one week. You can create incentive for the better teams by facing the #1 AAC team from the previous year against the #1 MW team, the #2 against #2, and so on. You can have the AAC - MW challenge one weekend where they can keep tally of the record VS the other conference.

Obviously the conferences have different numbers of teams and these would be scheduled on relatively short notice, but at least it's a partial solution and it doesn't necessarily cause the G5 to cannibalize each other.

I think this works for basketball (and Mark Adams actually suggested an alliance for the better non-P5 schools in the past), but I am not so certain it works in FB. In basketball voters actually look at RPI, Kenpom and other types of metrics.

FB is a different animal. Value is more perception vs. reality. The voters actually value scheduling a bottom feeder P5 school over the best G5 school (because they perceive every P5 school is > than any G5 school despite evidence to the contrary, including head to head wins).

Voters value a slate of conference games. Frankly, when UCF is logging conference wins against UC, UCONN and ECU when you add it to FIU and Maine it looks to the rest of the world like they have 5 FCS games on the schedule.

(01-09-2018 09:34 AM)doss2 Wrote:  Bad idea as all schools but 2 would lose 1/12th of ticket and TV. For you non financial types losing over 8% is huge.

Most G5 schools do not expect to contend for NC. Yes a handful think they could, UCF, USF, UH, Boise, UC, SDSU, etc. but the majority are stuck and accept it. We are in the group that aspire but likely that is where it ends.

Maybe all the other schools could play a game that week as well, to fill up their quota. IDK, just trying to think of some ideas.

I also think the better G5 schools need to stop scheduling FCS teams, and find ways to at least get the better teams from each conference playin eachother. Why isn't Boise St. Scheduling AAC teams more often?

People will continue to schedule FCS teams because they need the extra guaranteed home game for revenue. G5 schools are living on credit cards and student subsidies. This entire system for the have nots is unsustainable.

The better play is for AAC teams to find a way to schedule more mediocre to mid-tier P5 schools. An OOC schedule that consists of Rutgers, Vandy and BC looks better to voters than San Diego State, Marshall and Toledo (even though on the field the former are better than the later).

(01-09-2018 12:23 PM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  People will continue to schedule FCS teams because they need the extra guaranteed home game for revenue. G5 schools are living on credit cards and student subsidies. This entire system for the have nots is unsustainable.

^^^^
Yup.

(01-09-2018 12:47 PM)CliftonAve Wrote:  The better play is for AAC teams to find a way to schedule more mediocre to mid-tier P5 schools. An OOC schedule that consists of Rutgers, Vandy and BC looks better to voters than San Diego State, Marshall and Toledo (even though on the field the former are better than the later).

But they don't, and this will continue to happen less and less as the conferences demand more conference games and have scheduling alliances with other P5s.

Cincinnati has done well to schedule UCLA and Wisconsin as well as other higher-level G5 schools like Marshall, Boise, and Fresno, but if they're the only ones doing it the conference isn't gaining in the perception column, which really needs to happen in order to get any respect from the voters for winning games against your conference mates. If that helps your 10, 17, and 24-ranked teams in conference improve incrementally to 7, 13, and 19 (while possibly adding another to the Top 25) for example, it looks better.

(01-09-2018 12:23 PM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  People will continue to schedule FCS teams because they need the extra guaranteed home game for revenue. G5 schools are living on credit cards and student subsidies. This entire system for the have nots is unsustainable.

You're likely right, but if they gave up a guaranteed home game every year against an FBS to secure instead a home-and-home early season matchup against a similar strength G5 opponent, which would be more notable from a national media standpoint? Would we be closer to ESPN 1 with UC vs Austin Peay and 25,000 fans in Nippert? Or UC vs Boise or Oregon State on National Television? The latter will increase the value of the conference's media deal, which will ultimately provide more financial impact per year than a poorly-attended FBS matchup at Nippert.