Sitting there at Nos. 8 and 9 in the College Football Playoff rankings, it will probably come as no surprise that the coaches of Cincinnati and Georgia favor expansion.
Interestingly, Georgia coach Kirby Smart said Thursday he’d like to see the playoff field expanded to more than eight teams. He suggested 12.
“I would be much more in favor of saying, ‘All right, let’s go to 12’ and have eight teams play it out and maybe the first four get a bye or something like that,” Smart said during a Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl video conference call Thursday. “I’d rather go further than eight if we’re going to do it. I certainly think if they do that, somebody in the back, 6, 7 or 8, is going to win a national championship at some point. And that’s giving everybody a realistic shot.”
Cincinnati coach Luke Fickell would like anything more than four, which has been the number of teams included since current system was created in 2014. His undefeated Bearcats (9-0), champions of the American Athletic Conference, represent yet another unbeaten Group of Five team that was left out of the playoffs.
But Fickell argued that it’s not just about teams like his getting a chance. He said it’s also about keeping college football players engaged.
“When you start to have more guys that maybe don’t play in the bowl games, opt-out, whatever it is, I think the way to continue to keep the stakes high and keep the guys involved might be to someway, somehow expand the playoffs,” said Fickell, a former Ohio State player and longtime assistant coach for the Buckeyes.
“I think that’s a better idea than just say, ‘Hey, we need to give a team like Cincinnati an opportunity to be in the playoffs’ and the only way to do that is to expand the playoffs.”
At least five Georgia players have chosen not to play in the Peach Bowl. Cincinnati has not reported any opt-outs, but leading rusher Gerrid Doaks and safety James Wiggins are considered questionable because of leg injuries suffered in the conference title game.
As it is, No. 9 Georgia (7-2) and the eighth-ranked Bearcats will meet at noon Friday at Mercedes-Benz Stadium with nothing but bragging rights on the line. The Bulldogs effectively saw their playoff hopes disappear in Game 6 when they played short-handed against Florida and lost 44-28 in Jacksonville. That meant the Gators, rather than Georgia, represented the Eastern Division in the SEC Championship game for the first time in four years.
Florida lost to Alabama 52-46, leaving the No. 1-ranked Crimson Tide (11-0) as the SEC’s only representative in the playoff. Top-seeded Alabama plays Notre Dame (10-1) in the relocated Rose Bowl semifinals on Friday, while No. 2 Clemson (10-1) and No. 3 Ohio State (6-0) meet in the Sugar Bowl semi.
Georgia made the playoff in 2017, defeating Oklahoma 54-48 in double-overtime in the Rose Bowl. The third-seeded Bulldogs then fell to fourth-seeded Alabama in the national championship game 26-23 in overtime.
Smart is still not happy about the Crimson Tide getting in that year despite not qualifying for the SEC Championship game that year. Georgia defeated Auburn for the conference championship that season.
But Smart also uses that as an example why more teams should be involved.
“You know, Alabama sits at home and doesn’t play in an SEC Championship game, and they’re the 4 seed,” he said. “You could argue that that may have helped them, playing one less game. But they won the national championship from a 4 seed. You know, what’s to say the fifth seed or sixth seed or seventh seed doesn’t get hot and play well and have an opportunity to win it all.”
Though he certainly has the right to, Fickell actually hasn’t complained excessively about his team being left out of the playoff this year. He said the Bearcats normally make a point to schedule as many Power 5 opponents as they can in non-conference play. They were slated to play Nebraska in Week 4 this year before the pandemic altered everybody’s schedules.
Cincinnati played UCLA and Ohio State in 2019, UCLA and Virginia Tech in 2018 and Michigan in 2017. The Bearcats are 3-2 in those games, losing to Ohio State 42-0 last season.
“Everybody earns an opportunity to be in the playoffs,” Fickell said. “Sometimes the chips don’t fall where you want them to fall. You get your non-conference games canceled, and you probably aren’t going to get an opportunity. So, I don’t think we expand just to try to include everybody. Maybe we expand because it’s going to keep the kids and players more involved, which gives our programs better opportunities to have success and at least finish the season off the way you want to as a whole. So, I think there’s a lot of things to be said about that.”
Ultimately, both coaches agree that which teams get the opportunity to compete for championships should be decided on the field and not in a conference room.
“I would concur with Luke,” Smart said. “I’ve always been of the opinion that the decisions and the outcomes and the championships and the trophies should be decided on the field. It’s harder and harder every year to agree that it’s decided on the field because there’s always someone that’s arguably left out.”
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