HOOVER, Ala.—Not all of the talk at SEC Media Days this week was about the fast-approaching 2012 football season. Much of it was about the 2014 season, when college football will debut a four-team playoff for the national championship.
SEC coaches generally cheered this summer's approval of the playoff plan, but that didn't stop them from pontificating about quirks in the system, impact on regular-season scheduling and size of the field.
"To be honest with you ... there's going to be unintended circumstances or consequences that a lot of people don't think about," Auburn coach Gene Chizik said. "I can think of scenarios in my mind right now."
As an example, he offered a scenario in which teams ranked Nos. 1 and 2 in the nation meet in a conference championship game — and the No. 2 team wins.
"Then 2 becomes 1, and 1 becomes 4," said Chizik, predicting the impact on the polls. "So they're going to rematch the next game."
In other words, a national semifinal, pitting the No. 1 seed vs. the No. 4 seed, could be an instant replay of the SEC Championship game.
But "for the most part," Chizik said, the playoff plan appears "well thought out" and a "movement in the right direction."
Several coaches wondered how the playoff will affect scheduling. Since strength of schedule will be one of the criteria considered by a committee in selecting the field, the SEC likely will revisit whether to expand conference schedules from eight games to nine, which had some support even before the playoff was adopted.
Tennessee coach Derek Dooley said this week that he favors a nine-game schedule for the 14-member league because with the exception of one annual cross-division opponent, teams will face schools in the other division only once every six years under the current scheduling model. Dooley thinks such infrequency will diminish fans' "familiarity" with the full league.
"We don't want to lose what makes this league special," he said.
Alabama coach Nick Saban also said he favors a nine-game conference schedule because "every player should have the opportunity to play every SEC school in his career."
SEC schools with annual non-conference intra-state rivalry games — primarily Georgia, Florida and South Carolina -- have tended to oppose a nine-game league schedule. Some other schools have been concerned that an additional SEC game would make it harder to become bowl-eligible.
But the opponents of a nine-game conference schedule could reconsider or be outvoted as the SEC positions itself for the playoff era.
SEC commissioner Mike Slive said conferences and schools will need to balance their non-conference scheduling philosophies against the strength of their league schedules.
Saban is opposed to another criteria the playoff selection committee will consider: whether a team won its conference championship.
"I think whoever's making the statements about conference champions is really making a statement against the SEC and against any league that has more than one good team who would qualify [and] is trying to enhance the opportunity for somebody from their own league to get in," Saban said.
Coaches expressed varying views on whether the four-team field eventually should grow.
South Carolina's Steve Spurrier said he prefers an eight-team field featuring champions of the six major conferences and two at-large teams.
"If I was calling the shots ... that's the way I would do it," Spurrier said. "It's not going to happen, but anyway ..."
Georgia's Mark Richt said a four-team field is "the right amount" because it is small enough to preserve the traditional bowl system and the importance of the regular season.
"If you ever get to a 16-team playoff — I'd just hate to see a day where we might play Florida and whether we win or lose no one thinks it's that big of a deal [because] you still go to the playoffs," Richt said.
Although the next two seasons will be played under the BCS system, the coaches already seem intrigued by what 2014 will bring.
"Here we go," LSU's Les Miles said. "What the country asked for is what they're getting, and that's a little bit more playoff and a little bit more games and a greater view. I think it will eventually work out very effectively."
