First of all, let me preface this by saying that I am 99.99999999% sure that this will never happen. Money means more than geography or tradition and, quite frankly, what I'm about to put out here makes too much actual sense to ever be implemented. Having said that, I feel like I've been seeing more articles lately about conference re-alignment ideas, so here is mean. For starters, I think all of the P5 conferences should expand to 14 teams, with it looking as follows:
ACC North
Boston College
Miami (yes, I know they are in the south, but you have to work with me on this one)
Notre Dame
Pittsburgh
Syracuse
Virginia
Virginia Tech
ACC South
Clemson
Duke
Florida State
Georgia Tech
North Carolina
North Carolina State
Wake Forest
Big Ten East
Indiana
Maryland
Michigan
Michigan State
Ohio State
Penn State
Rutgers
Big Ten West
Illinois
Iowa
Minnesota
Nebraska
Northwestern
Purdue
Wisconsin
Big 12 North
Colorado
Iowa State
Kansas
Kansas State
Missouri
Oklahoma
Oklahoma State
Big 12 South
Baylor
Houston
SMU
TCU
Texas
Texas A&M
Texas Tech
Pac-12 North
Boise State
California
Oregon
Oregon State
Stanford
Washington
Washington State
Pac 12 South
Arizona
Arizona State
BYU
San Diego State
UCLA
USC
Utah
SEC East
Florida
Georgia
Kentucky
Louisville
South Carolina
Tennessee
West Virginia
SEC West
Alabama
Arkansas
Auburn
LSU
Mississippi State
Ole Miss
Vanderbilt
The ACC North looks like the old Big East, plus Virginia and Notre Dame (and Notre Dame had strong ties to the old Big East), while the ACC South is made up of ACC blue-bloods. The Big Ten is untouched. The Big 12 North looks mostly like the old Big 12, and the Big 12 south looks like the old Southwest Conference. The Pac-12 loses Colorado, who shouldn't be there anyway, but picks up arguably three of the most attractive non-P5 schools out there. And the SEC gets Louisville and WVU, who I think both "fit" that conference better than where they are currently at, plus Vanderbilt draws the short straw by being moved to the West division. Schools like Cincinnati, UCF, and USF are left on the outside looking in, but you can't please everybody.
The G5 conferences would then be divided into equal conferences of 12 and would more or less operate separately. In my world they would even have their own postseason, and name their own champion.
From a scheduling perspective, teams would still play 12 games each, including nine conference games. You would play the six others schools in your division, as well as three out of the seven schools from the other division in your conference on a rotating basis. For your three OOC games, P5 teams would be mandated to play two other P5 programs (one at home, one away), with an emphasis placed on historical rivalries. In the case of Pitt, we'd strive to play home-and-homes with Penn State and WVU each year. A school like Notre Dame might play Michigan and USC. Florida plays Florida State. Georgia plays Georgia Tech. And so on. Losing these games in close fashion would be rewarded in the CFP selection process, or at least would not be held against a school, when compared to the team that gets to beat up on a school like Rutgers in OOC play. At the end of the day, the goal would be to have all schedules as equal as possible, with teams playing no more than 7 home games.
For your third OOC game, since there would be 60 G5 schools as opposed to 70 P5 schools, each P5 school could not play a G5 school every year. Having said that, I would make it a requirement that the P5 play six G5 schools for every seven seasons, allowing them to play an FCS opponent once every seven years. The goal would be to eliminate FCS games as much as possible. All of these G5/FCS games would occur Week One, and would effectively be a preseason game. This game does count though, and losing it would be detrimental. Scheduling these games would actually be the hardest thing to coordinate, in my opinion, but the goal is to give the college football fan the best game possible for that first home game, rather than trot out an FCS school.
As for the postseason, the conference championships would proceed as they are now following the regular season. The CFP would be expanded to 8 teams, with each conference champion being auto-awarded a spot as well as three at-large bids. The Rose, Sugar, Fiesta, Orange, Cotton, and Peach Bowls would host rounds one and two (six games total) on a rotating basis, with a random host city selected each year for that national title, similar to what is done now. The G5 would do their own tournament as well to award a G5 champion, no different than the FCS, D-II, or D-III does.
The top 16 P5 schools who were not invited to the CFP, each of whom must have 8 wins, may be invited to participate in an "upper-tier" bowl season against one another (these 16 schools plus the 8 CFP teams are effectively your top 25). These would be the Sun Bowl, Gator Bowl, Outback Bowl, Citrus Bowl, Holiday Bowl, Alamo Bowl, Liberty Bowl, and Tangerine Bowl (which has had 9 million different sponsors and was most recently the Camping World Bowl). There would be no bowl ties, but those 8 bowls must take teams from the talent pool I described, so no snatching up a 7-win Notre Dame team to sell tickets. This would also hopefully provide some variety and excitement to postseason play so schools are not seeing the same teams every year.
Any remaining P5 school who was not selected for the CFP, was not selected for the "upper-tier" bowl games, and had at least six wins (should be about 20 additional schools), would be placed in the "lower tier" bowls against one another. These would be the Pinstripe Bowl, Belk Bowl, Independence Bowl, Music City Bowl, Birmingham Bowl, etc. Again, for the purpose of variety and new, exciting match-ups, there would be no bowl ties and these bowls would be free to invite any of the next 20 schools.
So that's my big idea. Obviously a lot of chairs would have to be moved around on the deck with conference alignment, and you'd have to get the G5 to basically accept living in a world where they operate independently as the little brother, but I think this type of system really reigns in some of the postseason craziness where we now have seemingly 50 bowls and Pitt has to play a school like Eastern Michigan. I also think this really rewards the college football fan by focusing on history and geography, while also making the postseason a little more random and exciting.
ACC North
Boston College
Miami (yes, I know they are in the south, but you have to work with me on this one)
Notre Dame
Pittsburgh
Syracuse
Virginia
Virginia Tech
ACC South
Clemson
Duke
Florida State
Georgia Tech
North Carolina
North Carolina State
Wake Forest
Big Ten East
Indiana
Maryland
Michigan
Michigan State
Ohio State
Penn State
Rutgers
Big Ten West
Illinois
Iowa
Minnesota
Nebraska
Northwestern
Purdue
Wisconsin
Big 12 North
Colorado
Iowa State
Kansas
Kansas State
Missouri
Oklahoma
Oklahoma State
Big 12 South
Baylor
Houston
SMU
TCU
Texas
Texas A&M
Texas Tech
Pac-12 North
Boise State
California
Oregon
Oregon State
Stanford
Washington
Washington State
Pac 12 South
Arizona
Arizona State
BYU
San Diego State
UCLA
USC
Utah
SEC East
Florida
Georgia
Kentucky
Louisville
South Carolina
Tennessee
West Virginia
SEC West
Alabama
Arkansas
Auburn
LSU
Mississippi State
Ole Miss
Vanderbilt
The ACC North looks like the old Big East, plus Virginia and Notre Dame (and Notre Dame had strong ties to the old Big East), while the ACC South is made up of ACC blue-bloods. The Big Ten is untouched. The Big 12 North looks mostly like the old Big 12, and the Big 12 south looks like the old Southwest Conference. The Pac-12 loses Colorado, who shouldn't be there anyway, but picks up arguably three of the most attractive non-P5 schools out there. And the SEC gets Louisville and WVU, who I think both "fit" that conference better than where they are currently at, plus Vanderbilt draws the short straw by being moved to the West division. Schools like Cincinnati, UCF, and USF are left on the outside looking in, but you can't please everybody.
The G5 conferences would then be divided into equal conferences of 12 and would more or less operate separately. In my world they would even have their own postseason, and name their own champion.
From a scheduling perspective, teams would still play 12 games each, including nine conference games. You would play the six others schools in your division, as well as three out of the seven schools from the other division in your conference on a rotating basis. For your three OOC games, P5 teams would be mandated to play two other P5 programs (one at home, one away), with an emphasis placed on historical rivalries. In the case of Pitt, we'd strive to play home-and-homes with Penn State and WVU each year. A school like Notre Dame might play Michigan and USC. Florida plays Florida State. Georgia plays Georgia Tech. And so on. Losing these games in close fashion would be rewarded in the CFP selection process, or at least would not be held against a school, when compared to the team that gets to beat up on a school like Rutgers in OOC play. At the end of the day, the goal would be to have all schedules as equal as possible, with teams playing no more than 7 home games.
For your third OOC game, since there would be 60 G5 schools as opposed to 70 P5 schools, each P5 school could not play a G5 school every year. Having said that, I would make it a requirement that the P5 play six G5 schools for every seven seasons, allowing them to play an FCS opponent once every seven years. The goal would be to eliminate FCS games as much as possible. All of these G5/FCS games would occur Week One, and would effectively be a preseason game. This game does count though, and losing it would be detrimental. Scheduling these games would actually be the hardest thing to coordinate, in my opinion, but the goal is to give the college football fan the best game possible for that first home game, rather than trot out an FCS school.
As for the postseason, the conference championships would proceed as they are now following the regular season. The CFP would be expanded to 8 teams, with each conference champion being auto-awarded a spot as well as three at-large bids. The Rose, Sugar, Fiesta, Orange, Cotton, and Peach Bowls would host rounds one and two (six games total) on a rotating basis, with a random host city selected each year for that national title, similar to what is done now. The G5 would do their own tournament as well to award a G5 champion, no different than the FCS, D-II, or D-III does.
The top 16 P5 schools who were not invited to the CFP, each of whom must have 8 wins, may be invited to participate in an "upper-tier" bowl season against one another (these 16 schools plus the 8 CFP teams are effectively your top 25). These would be the Sun Bowl, Gator Bowl, Outback Bowl, Citrus Bowl, Holiday Bowl, Alamo Bowl, Liberty Bowl, and Tangerine Bowl (which has had 9 million different sponsors and was most recently the Camping World Bowl). There would be no bowl ties, but those 8 bowls must take teams from the talent pool I described, so no snatching up a 7-win Notre Dame team to sell tickets. This would also hopefully provide some variety and excitement to postseason play so schools are not seeing the same teams every year.
Any remaining P5 school who was not selected for the CFP, was not selected for the "upper-tier" bowl games, and had at least six wins (should be about 20 additional schools), would be placed in the "lower tier" bowls against one another. These would be the Pinstripe Bowl, Belk Bowl, Independence Bowl, Music City Bowl, Birmingham Bowl, etc. Again, for the purpose of variety and new, exciting match-ups, there would be no bowl ties and these bowls would be free to invite any of the next 20 schools.
So that's my big idea. Obviously a lot of chairs would have to be moved around on the deck with conference alignment, and you'd have to get the G5 to basically accept living in a world where they operate independently as the little brother, but I think this type of system really reigns in some of the postseason craziness where we now have seemingly 50 bowls and Pitt has to play a school like Eastern Michigan. I also think this really rewards the college football fan by focusing on history and geography, while also making the postseason a little more random and exciting.
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