Last June, the college football world experienced some excitement at the idea of a 12-team CFP. A format and qualifying criteria were announced. However, there were too many "little details" that just couldn't fit together. And so we hold onto 4, for 4 more seasons.
So when that time comes - and have no doubt, the time to start planning is now - what all needs to be satisfied? Let's dig in, piece by piece.
Now that the regular season and championship weekend are in the books, we can finally make the final predictions for the New Year's Six. Let's see how accurate this ends up being in the next 12-15 hours.
As promised in my Sunday post, a better look-ahead for this season's CFP/NY6 picture, based on the penultimate rankings.
In the past, I would take the weekly CFP rankings and project the New Year's Six bowls. I think that fell to the side last year because the COVID schedule was so crazy, and then I just forgot about it this year.
I tried to project out the bowls based on last week's rankings, but there were so many teams bunched up in the top that had yet to play each other. Now, with only conference championship games remaining, it's much easier, although I will hedge my bets with two scenarios.
Every year, it seems like the ACC divisional races get rather complicated and we spend a bunch of time parsing through the tiebreaker scenarios. But how often has the conference actually needed to use tiebreakers, and how far have they gone?
This post is an updated version of a post created a couple of years ago.
Finally, all of the conference championship games have been set. And uva still sucks.
ACC Championship: Wake Forest Demon Deacons (7-1) vs. Pitt Panthers (7-1)
Saturday, 8 PM, ABC.
SEC Championship: Georgia Bulldogs (8-0) vs. Alabama Crimson Tide (7-1)
Saturday, 4 PM, CBS.
Big Ten Championship: Michigan Wolverines (8-1) vs. Iowa Hawkeyes (7-2)
Saturday, 8 PM, FOX.
Pac-12 Championship: Oregon Ducks (7-2) vs. Utah Utes (8-1)
Friday, 8 PM, ABC.
Big 12 Championship: Oklahoma State Cowboys (8-1) vs. Baylor Bears (7-2)
Saturday, 12 PM, ABC.
All of the divisional champs clinched their berths by having the best record in their respective divisions.
The only tiebreaker needed was for the second spot in the Big 12, where Baylor and Oklahoma had the same record but Baylor had the head-to-head.
We still have a full slate of Saturday games, but thanks to the extended holiday weekend, we had a decent set of Friday games that helped shape the conference races. While no one was able to clinch a championship game berth, every division with multiple contenders managed to narrow that number down to two.
Here is a list of all of the Power 5 games where there is something on the line (other than just rivalry trophies) -- be it conference championship berths or bowl eligibility. Saturday matchups have been updated due to Friday results.
