Tasked with doing the impossible of making everyone happy, the College Football Playoff Selection Committee may have done as good of a job putting together its first 12-team bracket on Sunday afternoon. Clemson winning the ACC could have messed things up considerably, but at the end of the day, the Selection Committee rewarded SMU with a playoff berth, despite losing in the ACC title.
One of the unintended consequences of expanding the playoff field thrice-fold is you create even more potential regular-season rematches in the playoff. While Georgia did get a rematch with Texas in the SEC Championship and Boise State drew UNLV again in the Mountain West title bout, we did not get rematches in the other three conference championships of note. Could they occur in the playoff?
Well, based on how the Selection Committee seeded the field, the only rematch from the regular season, and conference championships, that could occur before the national title would be No. 1 Oregon drawing No. 8 Ohio State in the Rose Bowl for their national quarterfinals. By seeding Texas, Penn State and Notre Dame as they did No. 5, No. 6 and No. 7 respectively, this is what all happened.
To date, we have yet to see a regular-season rematch happen in the first round of any playoff bracket.
What we have to remember is the College Football Playoff is a television event above everything else.
College Football Playoff may have seeded field to limit early rematches
Let's make one thing clear. If I were seeding the field, I may have done things differently. I would have had Notre Dame at No. 5, Texas at No. 6 and Penn State at No. 7. I may have had No. 8 Ohio State flipped with No. 9 Tennessee, possibly even No. 11 SMU swapped with No. 12 Clemson. This is splitting hairs, but how the seeded shook out offered another major unintended consequence, too.
Simply put, the Oregon side of the bracket is far more treacherous than the Georgia side. On the Ducks' side, you have No. 1 Oregon, No. 4 Arizona State, No. 5 Texas, No. 8 Ohio State, No. 9 Tennessee and No. 12 Clemson. You have three conference champions, one conference finalist, two 10-2 Power Two teams and no Group of Five team to be had. That side of the bracket is so loaded.
Now when we look at what the Dawgs have to do to get back to Atlanta for a third time this season, you have No. 2 Georgia, No. 3 Boise State, No. 6 Penn State, No. 7 Notre Dame, No. 10 Indiana and No. 11 SMU. You have a Power Four champion in Georgia, the Group of Five champion in Boise State, two Power Four finalists with Penn State and SMU and two 11-1 teams with Indiana and Notre Dame.
What I am getting at is, whoever is on Georgia's side of the bracket has a far easier path of getting to Atlanta compared to who could come out of Oregon's half. In reality, there are about seven teams who can semi-realistically win a national championship, but only about four or maybe five who can run their gauntlet to hoist the College Football Playoff Trophy. Yes, there will be some rematches.
For now, we should look at the four first-round games and be ecstatic that we even get to see them.