One of the things I hate about the modern college football world are the conferences. Many lack tradition, most broke up tradition, and, for almost all of them, are way too big. What's the point of being part of a conference if you only get to play a member once every eight year? (Okay that's an easy answer, $$$) On top of that, some across the country have become so lopsided that a conference championship game featuring two division champions has become more of a formality than a competition. The Coastal Division hasn't won the ACC since 2011, and the SEC West has won the past eight SEC Championship Games by an average score of 43-19.
Besides, the whole point of divisions within conferences (for geographical purposes) has become irrelevant with how spread-out some conferences are now. At this point, they're simply there for scheduling purposes and for the sake of tradition.
With that being said, I discovered an idea on the Rivals' national board that would solve a lot of the problems we have with our current system. Replace divisions with a rolling schedule.
Sorry if this has been discussed on here before, but it makes too much sense and it'd be easy to setup. Perhaps have one or two permanent "rivalries" that'd be played yearly and the rest of would revert to the rolling schedule.
Let's say our permanent rival is Syracuse, since most other schools would be taken already and we already have a cross-over "rivalry" with them. The ACC schools would be in alphabetical order and each school would flip as a home/away. So, under an eight-game ACC schedule (can easily be manipulated for nine games), our conference schedule would look like this
Year 1: at Syracuse; vs Boston College, at Clemson, vs Duke, at Florida State, vs Georgia Tech, at Louisville, vs Miami
Year 2: vs Syracuse; at NC State, vs North Carolina, at Virginia, vs Virginia Tech, at Wake Forest, at Boston College, vs Clemson
Notice how the schedule resets midway through Year 2 with Boston College being an away game as opposed to a home game in Year 1. Same way with Clemson. Also, notice how there's a lot more variety with these schedules as opposed to the same bland conference schedules we're stuck with right now (outside of the one different opponent each year).
For conference championships, you have a few options. You'd most likely use whichever two schools have the best conference records, or perhaps which schools are ranked the highest in the CFP rankings. Regardless, you'd end up with the best schools playing in the championship game, which isn't always the case right now.
Additionally, I think a move like this across the country would help speed up potential changes to the College Football Playoff. I feel like there's hesitation to change it to a system where a major conference champion gets an AQ because, under the current system, an 8-4 team could luck out, win one game, and advance to the playoffs. That would be nearly impossible in a division-less system.
Thoughts on this proposal? What say you?
Besides, the whole point of divisions within conferences (for geographical purposes) has become irrelevant with how spread-out some conferences are now. At this point, they're simply there for scheduling purposes and for the sake of tradition.
With that being said, I discovered an idea on the Rivals' national board that would solve a lot of the problems we have with our current system. Replace divisions with a rolling schedule.
Sorry if this has been discussed on here before, but it makes too much sense and it'd be easy to setup. Perhaps have one or two permanent "rivalries" that'd be played yearly and the rest of would revert to the rolling schedule.
Let's say our permanent rival is Syracuse, since most other schools would be taken already and we already have a cross-over "rivalry" with them. The ACC schools would be in alphabetical order and each school would flip as a home/away. So, under an eight-game ACC schedule (can easily be manipulated for nine games), our conference schedule would look like this
Year 1: at Syracuse; vs Boston College, at Clemson, vs Duke, at Florida State, vs Georgia Tech, at Louisville, vs Miami
Year 2: vs Syracuse; at NC State, vs North Carolina, at Virginia, vs Virginia Tech, at Wake Forest, at Boston College, vs Clemson
Notice how the schedule resets midway through Year 2 with Boston College being an away game as opposed to a home game in Year 1. Same way with Clemson. Also, notice how there's a lot more variety with these schedules as opposed to the same bland conference schedules we're stuck with right now (outside of the one different opponent each year).
For conference championships, you have a few options. You'd most likely use whichever two schools have the best conference records, or perhaps which schools are ranked the highest in the CFP rankings. Regardless, you'd end up with the best schools playing in the championship game, which isn't always the case right now.
Additionally, I think a move like this across the country would help speed up potential changes to the College Football Playoff. I feel like there's hesitation to change it to a system where a major conference champion gets an AQ because, under the current system, an 8-4 team could luck out, win one game, and advance to the playoffs. That would be nearly impossible in a division-less system.
Thoughts on this proposal? What say you?
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