Every sportschannel/website lately has been coming up with their own NCAA Football tournament. However, many of these tournaments are only 6-8 teams, and that isn’t nearly enough for a true playoff system in a league 119 Div I-A teams. So here is how I see a true playoff system being accomplished.

First to start things off, each team in the NCAA should play the same amount of games. I say 10-12 regular season games should fit the bill just fine. Equal amount of games played will come into play here in just a moment. Currently there are 11 conferences in D1-A along with 4 independent schools. First things first, those 4 schools must join a conference if they wish to participate in the tournament. Now, each conference will have one winner and that winner will represent said conference in the playoffs. After those 11 spots are filled there will be 5 wildcard teams that will be filled by the top 5 remaining teams in the BCS computers. These 16 teams will then play for the undisputed National Championship.

Here’s how the tournament will work. The first round will begin on the second weekend after the regular NCAA season ends, allowing one bye week to rest. Typically, this weekend would be the first weekend in December. First round games will be played at the home stadium of the top 8 seeded teams. Seeding will be determined by regular season record with standard tiebreakers. This will give smaller schools a fighting chance for home field advantage. Games will be played on Friday and Saturday to allow equal TV time and sponsorships. The second round will begin the next week and will be played again at the higher seeded team’s home field. Also, you could start playing games at neutral sites in this round, but that would require a lot more travel for teams and fans alike.

The Final Four will start the following week and will be played at neutral sites, preferably one east coast and one west coast. Also, I feel a Friday night and a Saturday night game will be the more beneficial in TV time and sponsorship money. Following the Final Four there will be a bye week to allow for teams to rest and time off for the Holiday season. The Championship game will then be played on or shortly after New Year’s Day at a predetermined neutral site. This site could rotate much the same as it does in the current BCS system. At the conclusion of the game, a new National Champion will be crowned with much less controversy as compared to the traditional voting and computer method.

Now, for one final issue that has not been addressed, bowl game money. Many critics of the tournament system state that schools would lose too much money by playing a tournament instead of individual bowl games. Well, here is one method I feel would help to alleviate those concerns. The money allocated to the schools during each round would be split equally among the competing schools, regardless if they win or lose.

Well, there is the skeleton plan for my version of an NCAA football championship. Questions, Comments, Constructive Criticisms are always appreciated.

Once I read it again I will be able to judge it a little better. However, your point about making the I-A Independents join a conference will hurt any chance of this happening. Without trying to sound like some cocky ND grad, Notre Dame will never join a conference until they feel it is economically enticing AND the NCAA will never permit it's most visible football team to be excluded from a championship tournament. So I don't see this happening.

I agree with your idea of rotating the championship game, but I think you have to take it one step further. You need to keep ALL the major bowls involved every year. The Big Four (Orange, Fiesta, Sugar, Rose) should be used for the semi-finals, finals and one other game. Moving the final 4 to some arbitrary East/West location would be more fair, but would never be seriously considered in the name of tradition and sponsorship money.

I agree about keeps the bowls as the semi and finals. No need to toss out tradition completely.

Now I know as a ND grad you're pretty adamant about keeping them independent. I guess the only problem with that is they wouldnt have a conference spot to play for and would only be eligible for one of the wild card seedings. That could hurt their chances in this system IMO.

when I talked about splitting the final four games between the east and west, that was being done with TV in mind, so both games could get equal television time. To keep with the tradition aspect on of those games could be a west coal bowl (Fiesta, Rose) and the other an east coast bowl (Orange, Sugar)

Personally, I dont think there would be that much of a fall off in overall sponsorship money. If anything, I believe sporsorship bids would increase due to the exclusivity of the championship games and the tournament. College basketball's March Madness is one of the most watched, most talked about playoff in sports. College Football is right behind the NFL as the most viewed sport in the USA. Combining March Madness with football has nowhere to take the sport and the television ratings but up. Plus it gives it a less controversial National Champion, just like every other college sport.

But like I said, this is only a skeleton plan with no numbers in place. There are bound to be tweaks and reorganizations of ideas here and there.

You know, thats not a bad idea. lets get some other ideas thrown out here and see if we can't come up with a feasible and solid tournament system. any takers?

I would do the matchups based on the coaches' poll. Number 20 plays number 1, number 19 plays number 2, etc...

I would never trust the coaches. None of them watch any of the other games besides their own and future opponents. The average college football fan has more widespread exposure to top college teams than the average college coach.

It's not to say I blame them, but these coaches put in 70 hour weeks NOT including Saturdays which is the only real chance to see a variety of other games. Plus I feel that coaches are biased towards their own conferences. But I every system will have its flaws.