One good thing about having a season where no one knows what will happen and nothing is set in stone is that, well, nothing is set in stone.
Over the first two full weeks (plus a slightly expanded “Week 0”) of the college football season, more than a dozen games have been postponed or canceled, with more coming every week as of now.
What does this mean for the College Football Playoff? Teams will play different numbers of games to begin with (ACC teams will play 11, Big Ten teams only nine, for example), and more of that will change as the season goes on. If a Power 5 conference misses a week or two, we don’t know if games will be made up?
So how is the selection committee supposed to judge disparate schedules? Honestly, it’s not particularly more different than judging different schedule strengths in any other year. Sure, the lack of nonconference games makes it tough to determine conference strength. That will be an issue to somehow solve. Overall, though, the same basic principle is the same: watch the games, just the results, see who’s “best.”
Of course, a major problem over the years is that the selection committee has almost always defaulted to number of losses as the first way to determine where a team ranks. With some teams playing more games than others, that seems less fair. Then again, when you consider the fact that most of the canceled games this season (at least as far as Power 5 conferences are concerned), the number of games that actually include risking a loss hasn’t changed much this year. Usually, we see the Big Ten, Big 12, and Pac 12 play one more conference game than the SEC and ACC. This year, the Big Ten will play one fewer than the others. It’s a reversal of a fundamental inequity, but in principle it doesn’t change how the selection committee will judge teams.
One of the most important things we’ve learned in the entire sports world this year is just how flexible sports really can be. Until 2020, we’ve felt that TV contracts lock schools and conferences in for when games are played. 2020 has taught us that live sports are television’s king, and the networks will always find some way to make a schedule work. In a way–at least for this year–it’s pretty clear that the planned dates of every game are far more guidelines than rules.
That applies, as well, to the College Football Playoff and the semifinal games. We know the planned dates and that the CFP has said it wants to keep them. We also know now, though, that they’ll move the games in a heartbeat if it’s better for the sport. Normally, moving the Rose Bowl off of New Year’s Day would be the biggest obstacle here, but with the Rose Parade already canceled that seems less of an issue.
So what happens if games are canceled or postponed? What happens if COVID strings the season along and too many schools miss a few weeks? Nothing official has been said, of course, but we can be pretty sure that the CFP will know that postponing is an option. ESPN won’t fight too hard to keep the games on any particular date. As long as the network gets the games in the end, it will air them whenever makes the most sense.
Maybe the CFP will stick to its dates even if contenders have only played six or seven games. It’s definitely possible. But we’ve learned that anyone and everyone can be flexible and make last-minute changes in 2020. And that’s a lesson that will do the college football world a lot of good.
Week 3 Implications
Nothing major occurred this past week on the field, and more canceled games was the biggest storyline. (Baylor-Houston and Army-BYU seem like the canceled games most likely with potential Playoff impact, but we’re still very early in the season.) Georgia State upsetting Louisiana could have been painful for the Big 12, but Iowa State and the contenders are thankful that the Ragin’ Cajuns pulled through in overtime. Similarly, Oklahoma State survived a too-close battle against Tulsa; a loss there could have been devastating, but the Cowboys survived.
Next week, though, the SEC jumps into the fray. We’ll finally have a weekend where most of the ranked teams are playing competitive games.
We’ve had a three-week prelude to the season, which included the Big 12 stumbling out of the blocks. We won’t see the full Playoff picture begin to take shape for at least a few weeks. But this coming Saturday we’ll hopefully start to get some separation as to who are the major players in the Big 12, ACC, and SEC.
Make you follow the All Sports Discussion Twitter account at @AllSportsDACC and please like our Facebook Page
Leave a Reply