The leaders of both the SEC and BIG 10 college football conferences are meeting right now in New Orleans, and the hottest topic has been playoff expansion. It is almost a foregone conclusion that as soon as possible, the College Football Playoff will expand from 12 to 14 teams, and then probably to 16 after that. But who should be included in the College Football Playoff? As it sits, the highest ranked conference champions got the top 4 spots, which includes a first round bye. This format ended up with teams like Boise State and Arizona State getting byes over the likes of Texas, Ohio State, Penn State, and Notre Dame, the teams that would end up comprising the 4 semi-final teams in the Playoff.
This format is the most likely of all of the playoff qualifiers to change, as neither Boise State or Arizona State finished in the regular season top-5, and Arizona State even finished outside of the top-10! One of the other topics that is being brought up by the 2 biggest conferences in the country, is how many automatic bids should go to each conference. As of now, the number being thrown around in New Orleans is 4 each.
This means that currently, 8 of the 12 teams that make it in to the playoff would be from the SEC and BIG 10, leaving only 4 spots for schools in other conferences. If the number of teams in the playoff is expanded, like it probably will be, then this number does not look near as big, but even with a 16 team playoff, this would mean that half of the teams in the playoff would be from only 2 conferences. But why? Do these conferences need at-large bids at all? If these 2 conferences are truly the biggest and baddest conferences in the nation, wouldn’t it stand to reason that on some years they may have MORE than 4 teams in the playoff if all of the bids were at-large bids instead of automatic? Andy Bunker and Randy McMichael expand more on the soon to come conference expansion that is currently being discussed.