UPDATED 4/26 @ 2:45 p.m. ET: To steal a line from SI’s Andy Staples: happy V-BCS day.
In an announcement that is surprising to probably no one, yet is nevertheless important, the BCS has recommended that there be a playoff in major college football beginning in 2014.
Or, a four-team event. Whatever. I don’t care. It’s a playoff.
The BCS announced Wednesday that there are between two and seven variations of a four-team playoff being considered, with plus-one, eight-team and 16-team options officially off the table (for now).
It’s also worth noting the three-semifinal option (i.e., the Rose Bowl plan) has been given the pink slip as well.
How the selections for the four teams will be made, not to mention other logistics, are still to be determined, but we do know that automatic qualifying status is officially dead starting in 2014, according to BCS executive director Bill Hancock.
We’ll have more on this later, but for now, we want to hear your thoughts on the decision:
[polldaddy poll=6175544]
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No one is quite sure yet -- not even the BCS committee -- what major college football’s postseason will look like in the foreseeable future.
One thing is for sure, though. It won’t look like the current system.
Thank. You.
On the first of a two-day set of meetings over the BCS/playoff discussion, college football got perhaps its most explicit news to date regarding how a national champion will be decided.
Of all people, the news came from BCS executive director, Bill Hancock.
“I can officially say that the status quo is off the table,” Hancock (pictured) said. “The BCS as we know it with the exact same policies will not continue.”
Meanwhile, Dan Wetzel of Yahoo! Sports and many others with a brain rejoice in the streets.
The BCS committee, composed of all 11 conference commissioners and Notre Dame athletic director Jack Swarbrick, has been whittling down as many as 50-60 postseason ideas since January with a final decision expected to be made in July.
Earlier this month, the committee announced it had narrowed discussions into four primary preferences. Of those four, it appears a true plus-one or a “four team event” (which is really a playoff for normal people like you and me, but a four-letter word for BCS supporters) with semifinal games hosted at neutral locations are the most likely choices -- with an emphasis on the latter.
But don’t get too ahead of yourself. Selection criteria (the BCS committee spent four hours going over that today) and the definition of “neutral” (in other words, does neutral mean a bowl game site? A site bid? A combination?) are still some of the items up for debate. The 11 BCS committee members will reportedly take two or three “finalist” ideas back to their conferences for further discussion.
Although it sounds as though the primary options have been decided.