No Divisions, Just Conferences
I’m sitting here watching the SEC Championship game–a game in which I’m sure Missouri will lose big for the second straight year. Last year the Missouri Tigers lost 59-42 to the Auburn Tigers. This year Mizzou plays Alabama. Let’s be real, if Missouri was in the SEC West, consistently playing the likes of Alabama, Auburn, and LSU, they’d finish with 3-4 conference losses and not even sniff the title game.
GET RID OF DIVISIONS WITHIN CONFERENCES! Keep the conferences of course, just mix up the conference schedules each season while keeping the rivalries in place (i.e. Alabama v Auburn, Ohio State v Michigan) and take the two best teams from the Conference for the Conference Championship game.
If Missouri beats Alabama, are we supposed to all believe that the Tigers are the best team in the SEC? C’mon! No way! They’re the 7th best team in the SEC, 6th at best. I’d take Bama, Auburn, LSU, Ole Miss, Miss St and Georgia all over Mizzou. Before the SEC Title game vs. Bama, Mizzou played one game against a team currently in the Top 25. That team was Georgia and the Bulldogs rolled Mizzou 34-0. Mizzou has no business being in the SEC Title game. Fans are being robbed of what should be a classic game. And it would be a classic game if the NCAA would eliminate the divisions within conferences and just take the best two teams from the conference–which this year you’ll tell me would still have been Missouri and Alabama, but my argument is no it wouldn’t have been because Missouri’s schedule wouldn’t have been packed with conference cupcakes like Kentucky, Tennessee and Vanderbilt in place of Bama, Auburn, Mississippi State, etc. Keep all rivalry games intact, but beyond that, mix up the schedules each season so teams like Auburn don’t have to beat 6 ranked teams to make SEC Title game from the West while Mizzou only plays one currently ranked team (and loses big) and still makes the Title game. What a joke!
And Big 12, pull your head out and get a Championship game in place so we can all feel confident putting one of your teams in the Playoff! Who wouldn’t want to see a neutral field rematch of TCU and Baylor? I know I sure would!
In 2011, Oregon played unranked, 6-6 (5-4) UCLA for the Pac-12 Championship. Why? Because 11-1 (8-1) Stanford is in the same division as Oregon (and USC was unable to participate due to NCAA violations). Why not a Stanford vs. Oregon rematch though?!?
Speaking of 2011, let’s look at the SEC Championship game. The two best teams in the SEC were clearly LSU and Alabama, so much so that they both landed in the BCS National Championship game despite the fact that Alabama was unable to play LSU in the SEC Title game since they’re both from the SEC West. So the Bayou Bengals went and crushed an overmatched Georgia team 42-10. The rest of the NCAA was punished as a result. Why? Because Alabama and LSU played in the National Championship game when if they had just rematched in their own Conference Championship game, a champ from another conference could have had a crack at Goliath. So Bama won the National Championship without even playing in it’s own Conference championship game.
In 2012 the same thing happened in the Pac-12 as happened in 2011, only Stanford beat 9-3 (6-3) UCLA in the Pac-12 Championship while 11-1 (8-1) Oregon had to watch the Pac’s Title game on TV since Stanford and Oregon are both in the Pac North. What a shame.
I’ll say it again: GET RID OF DIVISIONS WITHIN CONFERENCES! Mix up the schedules each year with the exception of big rivalry games (i.e. Alabama v Auburn, Ohio State v Michigan) and take the two best teams from the Conference for the Conference Championship game.