Changes coming to CCG's next season?

[Used 2 B Hu]

We might see a movement away from divisional play and the conference championship format pioneered by the Southeast Conference more than 20 years ago. from a See Bee Ess article:

ACC commissioner John Swofford said the NCAA board will consider in April legislation from the ACC and Big 12 to give conferences autonomy on how they stage conference championship games. The legislation would eliminate the requirement that in order to stage a conference championship game a league must have 12 teams, round-robin divisional play and pair two division champions for the championship.

There appears to be considerable support for allowing conferences, not the NCAA, to decide how to stage league championship games.

"I think it would be in keeping with the decentralization of a lot of things in the NCAA," Swofford said. "We're supportive of this mainly out of principle, not because we know what we would do if we had that autonomy."

The ACC has had mixed reviews internally about changing its championship game format. A positive is scrapping divisions would allow teams to play each other more frequently during the regular season.

"From a pure business standpoint, it could be helpful," Swofford said, referring to more attractive regular-season matchups for TV and attendance. "But you give up some things too. You give up divisional races, for one."

Several important pieces in there to de-construct:

First, it sounds like the ACC is trying to avoid having an imbalance between its divisions. 3 times in ten seasons since their expansion (2005, 2009, 2012), a team with a better record has finished second in their division and watched a team with a worse record from the other division play in the CCG. This seems like a bigger gripe in the SEC West, or would have been in the old Big Xii South. But if conferences can scrap the divisions, they can have better matchups with stronger teams in the CCG. That may be a negative when you have a 12-0 team losing to an 11-1 team that they already beat once in the regular season, but that can actually happen in the current format anyway. A positive, which is mentioned, is you get to preserve more traditional rivals and can have more flexible/frequent scheduling.

Second, Swofford refers to a "decentralization of things" from the NCAA, giving more power to the conferences. Specifically, the Power Five conferences. This sounds like the early rumblings of a complete breakaway from the parent company. He gives lip service to Kansas City, saying it's more about "principle" rather than autonomy, but the autonomy is definitely there.

Third, without the 12-team mandate, leagues can actually downsize and still do the money-grabbing CCG without the bulky 12-team, 2-division format. OR, they can make decisions based on how individual seasons play out, and choose to have the CCG or not. (That might not be plausible since the games are huge events that require a lot of advanced planning.) The Big Xii can stay where they are and not have to water down their product with 2 second-tier level teams, The AAC can stay at 11 schools and have a CCG, and the PAC can jettison Colorado and Utah and go back to their 10-team, 9-game schedule that they loved so much. Leagues may not want to shrink just now, but if that eventual breakaway from the NCAA happens, I think it's more likely that some teams get booted from their leagues.

 

[Sgt Brutus]

Wall of text!

 

[Used 2 B Hu]

Wall of text!

No, THIS is a wall of text:

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[Sgt Brutus]

I kinda like that

 

[Inquisitor95]

The main thing that needs to occur is that when there are playoff implications involved, the CCG should be between the 2 best teams in the conference, not necessarily the division winners.

 

[Codaxx]

The main thing that needs to occur is that when there are playoff implications involved, the CCG should be between the 2 best teams in the conference, not necessarily the division winners.

Sometimes that is the case. Problem is in most cases the conference championship is a negative. For some reason people do not seem to recognize that. ACC CCG has had very little benefit to the league. I am not sure about the pay-outs for the playoffs, but the risk of losing out on the playoffs so FSU can play Duke for a couple million may seen pretty stupid soon. Changing it to 1 v 2. SEC would have seen an LSU v Bama game a couple years ago. Instead of 2 playoff teams getting in it would have been 1 all for the sake of a rematch. I am not sure how that is good business sense.

 

[trojanfan12]

We might see a movement away from divisional play and the conference championship format pioneered by the Southeast Conference more than 20 years ago. from a See Bee Ess article:



Several important pieces in there to de-construct:

First, it sounds like the ACC is trying to avoid having an imbalance between its divisions. 3 times in ten seasons since their expansion (2005, 2009, 2012), a team with a better record has finished second in their division and watched a team with a worse record from the other division play in the CCG. This seems like a bigger gripe in the SEC West, or would have been in the old Big Xii South. But if conferences can scrap the divisions, they can have better matchups with stronger teams in the CCG. That may be a negative when you have a 12-0 team losing to an 11-1 team that they already beat once in the regular season, but that can actually happen in the current format anyway. A positive, which is mentioned, is you get to preserve more traditional rivals and can have more flexible/frequent scheduling.

Second, Swofford refers to a "decentralization of things" from the NCAA, giving more power to the conferences. Specifically, the Power Five conferences. This sounds like the early rumblings of a complete breakaway from the parent company. He gives lip service to Kansas City, saying it's more about "principle" rather than autonomy, but the autonomy is definitely there.

Third, without the 12-team mandate, leagues can actually downsize and still do the money-grabbing CCG without the bulky 12-team, 2-division format. OR, they can make decisions based on how individual seasons play out, and choose to have the CCG or not. (That might not be plausible since the games are huge events that require a lot of advanced planning.) The Big Xii can stay where they are and not have to water down their product with 2 second-tier level teams, The AAC can stay at 11 schools and have a CCG, and the PAC can jettison Colorado and Utah and go back to their 10-team, 9-game schedule that they loved so much. Leagues may not want to shrink just now, but if that eventual breakaway from the NCAA happens, I think it's more likely that some teams get booted from their leagues.

I think it will be pretty tough to boot teams out of conferences. It would be nice, but I just don't see many leaving willingly. Especially a team like Utah that wanted to get into the PAC for years, finally made it and is just now becoming a threat in the conference.

But I like the idea of league's being able to have a CCG even if they don't have 12 teams. Either way though, I think all conferences should be the same and either everyone has a CCG or no one does.

 

[Wild Turkey]

If a conference has 10 or fewer members and everyone plays one another a CCG is pointless. Sure this year the Big 12 potentially have TCU play Baylor to get into the playoff but that isn't going to happen every year and let's face it most of these CCGs are not that great.

As far as scaping divisions I'm for that as long as Auburn continues to play Alabama and Georgia every year I could really care less who we play in the SEC and would actually prefer to get Florida and Tenn more often as they were historical rivals for us.

The big problem I see is the potential for a team to slip through the cracks and play a very crappy conference schedule but that is happening in the East anyway so I guess it's worth a shot.

 

[Codaxx]

I think it will be pretty tough to boot teams out of conferences. It would be nice, but I just don't see many leaving willingly. Especially a team like Utah that wanted to get into the PAC for years, finally made it and is just now becoming a threat in the conference.

But I like the idea of league's being able to have a CCG even if they don't have 12 teams. Either way though, I think all conferences should be the same and either everyone has a CCG or no one does.

What they need to do is get bigger. Get to 20 team conferences with 2 divisions, which is basically 2 10-team leagues forming a coalition for negotiating and revenue reasons. Let the division champs play it out.

 

[Used 2 B Hu]

The main thing that needs to occur is that when there are playoff implications involved, the CCG should be between the 2 best teams in the conference, not necessarily the division winners.

Yep. And even then, it could come back to bite a conference.

This is where I think conferences should either get smaller, back down to 9 or 10 teams, or get bigger, and go 16 with two 8-team divisions -- they will probably insist on keeping themselves "intact" for marketing purposes. I can't fathom any team that's in the SEC wanting to be a part of a conference NOT named SEC, even though two divisions of 8 teams is virtually two different leagues.

If the East and West of the SEC were 8 teams each, you can play all of your division, at least 3 teams from the other division, and can still schedule your two cupcakes. And if there's no rule saying the two division winners HAVE to square off in the CCG, you can pick the two best teams even if they already played each other.

 

[Wild Turkey]

What they need to do is get bigger. Get to 20 team conferences with 2 divisions, which is basically 2 10-team leagues forming a coalition for negotiating and revenue reasons. Let the division champs play it out.

This is a better solution but one of the Big 5 has to fold to pull it off and that will cause a shit storm that will make it hard to do. Getting rid of divisions is something that could happen rather quickly and wouldn't garner as much resistance or lawsuits.

 

[Used 2 B Hu]

What they need to do is get bigger. Get to 20 team conferences with 2 divisions, which is basically 2 10-team leagues forming a coalition for negotiating and revenue reasons. Let the division champs play it out.

You beat me to it, but yeah. I think that's where we're headed.

That, or a four-division format where it looks more like the NFL conferences.

 

[Sgt Brutus]

You all be high in this thread

 

[Used 2 B Hu]

This is a better solution but one of the Big 5 has to fold to pull it off and that will cause a shit storm that will make it hard to do. Getting rid of divisions is something that could happen rather quickly and wouldn't garner as much resistance or lawsuits.

Let's fold the Big Ten!

 

[Used 2 B Hu]

Wisconsin to the PAC! Braska back to the Twelby-Twelb! Maryland and Rutgers to the AAC (not a typo, the AAC!)! Indiana to the SEC cause they're already competing with the East!

 

[Wild Turkey]

Let's fold the Big Ten!

I feel sorry for whoever has to take Ohio State and Nebraska then deal with their fans.

 

[trojanfan12]

What they need to do is get bigger. Get to 20 team conferences with 2 divisions, which is basically 2 10-team leagues forming a coalition for negotiating and revenue reasons. Let the division champs play it out.

I can see a couple of problems with this. For one, it could create a problem for traditional rivalries as well as having a negative effect on recruiting for some teams.

In the PAC, for example, all of the California teams (USC, UCLA, Stanford and Cal) all play each other every season. You can eliminate that problem by moving Stanford and Cal to the South. That would give the South 8 teams and they would just need to find 2 more to get to 10. However, that would leave the North with 4 teams and now needing to find 6 more. Where do these combined 8 teams come from? I can only think of maybe 3 teams in the region that are even close to ready to join a Power 5 conference (Boise, San Diego St. and Colorado St.) and even those 3 would have some serious work to do.

You'd also have to pretty much eliminate games between the 2 divisions which, in the PAC, would negatively effect recruiting for the North. California, specifically Southern California is a football recruiting hotbed and most of the teams in the PAC are built largely with California recruits. It would be tougher to get recruits out of California for the North teams because they wouldn't be getting to play in California and therefore wouldn't be seen as much.

If those problems could be eliminated, then I think it would be a good idea because it would effectively eliminate CCG re-matches.

 

[Used 2 B Hu]

You all be high in this thread

Caffeine is a helluva drug

 

[WizardHawk]

The latter part of your post is exactly why expansion won't happen in the Pac any time soon. It was hell just getting 12 to work in a way that kept the non cali schools on board. There is no scenario in which the Pac expands without EVERY team not in cali still gets at least one guaranteed road game in that state. It won't happen. Ever. There is no amount of muscle that would force it on those non cali schools.