Rozner: College football chaos only argues for expanded playoff

College football chaos is a beautiful thing.

Frustration helps. Anger is even better. And great teams being left out of the College Football Playoff - while painful for the fans today - is best of all.

Scream, definitely scream, if you're a fan of Penn State or Michigan. It's good for the game. It's good for the confused committee that came up with all sorts of bizarre explanations for how they selected - in order - Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State and Washington.

Big Ten champion Penn State is fifth and Michigan is sixth.

Where to start …

Well, Penn State won its conference championship and beat Ohio State, which obviously did not win the Big Ten and still gets the No. 3 seed in the playoff.

But the argument here is not against Ohio State. Not at all. It is one of the best four best teams in the country, but the committee spent the last few years telling us how important conference championship games were supposed to be.

Michigan defeated three top 10 teams in Wisconsin, Penn State and Colorado, with the Wolverines' only losses coming to Ohio State in double-overtime (by 3) and by 1-point at Iowa.

Meanwhile, Washington's nonconference strength of schedule was No. 127 in the country this season (second easiest), while Penn State's was 12th.

Then again, Washington only lost one game, and that was to USC (9-3), which won its last eight games by an average of 20 points, and boasted a strength-of-schedule ranking that was fifth-best in the country.

If you're keeping score at home, USC had the toughest schedule in the country among the top 10 teams, while Alabama was at No. 7, Clemson 47, Ohio State 15, Washington 55, Penn State 41, Michigan 33, Wisconsin 23 and Oklahoma 17.

Oh yeah, the Sooners. They finished seventh in the playoff rankings, though they won their last nine games by an average of 19 points after losing two of their first three to AP Poll No. 26 Houston (9-3) and Ohio State.

See where we're going here?

Washington deserves their position. Penn State has earned a chance. Michigan is certainly among the four best teams in the country. Wisconsin (No. 8) is really good.

And the two teams playing the best football right now - not named Alabama - are USC (No. 9) and Oklahoma, who didn't come close to making the Final Four.

You could absolutely find eight teams worthy of being in the tournament, and it's no stretch to say there are 12 really good college football teams.

It was fabulous news when the NCAA finally did away with the BCS and gave us a playoff system, but this is only the start and it's merely a matter of time before they give us eight teams.

Eight would be terrific. Twelve would be even better.

With 12, you could give four teams a bye and have eight remaining after the first round.

But whether it's eight or 12, teams can earn home playoff games before the Final Four bowl games and how big would that be on those college campuses?

And the argument that it makes regular season games less meaningful has been completely erased by the 2016 regular season, as has any discussion of ruining the bowl games.

When you look at the teams not making the playoff, how can you say any of their scheduled games didn't make a difference?

If anything, putting Washington in the playoff at No. 4, with their nonconference schedule, is proof that beating up on Rutgers, Idaho and Portland State didn't make any difference to the committee deciding who gets to play for the big prize.

Michigan, Wisconsin, Penn State, USC and Oklahoma can only wonder now if their brutal schedules did them any favors.

But all of these arguments can be settled easily in the future by adding at least four more teams to the playoff.

It's going to happen. The sooner the better.

brozner@dailyherald.com

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