Format change coming to College Football Playoff?

Arizona State, Boise State, Oregon all lost after receiving first-round byes

Penn State Nittany Lions running back Nicholas Singleton. / Joe Rondone/The Republic / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

The format of the inaugural 12-team College Football Playoff was intended to reward teams for winning a conference title. 

The five highest-ranked conference champions all received automatic bids to the playoff with the top four champions — No. 1 Oregon (Big Ten), No. 2 Georgia (SEC), No. 3 Boise State (Mountain West) and No. 4 Arizona State (Big 12) — getting first-round byes.

Changes could be coming next season as No. 5 Texas and No. 6 Penn State, the SEC and Big 10 runners-up, drew more favorable matchups in the quarterfinals than Oregon and Georgia. No. 8 Ohio State routed the Ducks 41-21 in Wednesday’s Rose Bowl while the Sugar Bowl matchup between Georgia and No. 7 Notre Dame — a one-point favorite over the Bulldogs — was moved to Thursday following a terror attack in New Orleans. 

Teams that received a first-round bye are 0-3 in the CFP entering the Sugar Bowl. Boise State dropped a 31-14 decision to Penn State in the Fiesta Bowl while Arizona State succumbed to Texas in double overtime, 39-31, in a Peach Bowl Classic. 

Arizona State, Boise State and Oregon all got off to slow starts coming off a lengthy layoff. 

The Broncos fell behind 14-0 immediately but rallied to make it a 17-14 game early in the third quarter. Arizona State dug itself a 17-3 hole before roaring back. The Buckeyes jumped out to a 34-0 lead and were never threatened in the Rose Bowl. 

Oregon head coach Dan Lanning refused to blame the bye for Oregon’s sluggish start.

“We had an opportunity. We didn’t take advantage of our opportunity. I’m not going to make excuses for our opportunity,” Lanning said. “Ultimately, you’ve got to beat great teams to be in position at the end of the year, and we didn’t do that. This is the road that we had to travel and they did it better than us tonight. So no complaints for us for having that opportunity. They just took advantage of it and we didn’t.”

Boise State head coach Spencer Danielson also made no excuses after out-gaining Penn State 412-387 in the Fiesta Bowl. The Broncos were uncharacteristically sloppy, committing 13 penalties for 90 yards with four turnovers. 

“You go into a game where a lot of people were counting us out, and we’re a couple plays away from winning,” Danielson said. “That’s football, though. We could lose to anybody in the country, but I also believe we can beat anybody in the country. We’ve shown that throughout this entire season, this entire body of work.”

Danielson doesn’t believe the College Football Playoff format should change moving forward. 

“With the expansion of the College Football Playoff, all you want is to give teams a chance,” he said. “Everybody knew how to make the playoffs at the start of the season. There was no gray area. … You gotta go out and win. We’ve been in playoff mentality since September. We knew after we lost on the last-second field goal to Oregon that we can’t lose again, and we didn’t.

“So to me, just set the standard, and it’s up to us as coaches to then get our team to go win games to make it to the playoffs. So I don’t think that should change. There’s been a lot of teams that have said that they should be in it. I’m curious how they played in their bowl games. To me, it’s all about ‘Put the ball down, play the game.’ Whatever they set to make the playoff, that’s on us as coaches and competitors to go get it done.”

MORE BOISE STATE NEWS & ANALYSIS

• What went wrong: 4 takeaways from Boise State’s Fiesta Bowl loss to Penn State

• What Boise State head coach Spencer Danielson, running back Ashton Jeanty said after Fiesta Bowl loss to Penn State

• What Penn State head coach James Franklin, tight end Tyler Warren, safety Zakee Wheatley said after Fiesta Bowl

• Ashton Jeanty falls just short of Barry Sanders’ single-season rushing record

• Game recap, analysis: Mistakes doom No. 3 Boise State in Fiesta Bowl loss to No. 6 Penn State

• Boise State transfer portal tracker: Ohio State offensive lineman signs with Broncos

• Boise State head coach Spencer Danielson: ‘What we did this year is not going to be enough going forward’

FOLLOW US ON SOCIAL MEDIA

Continue to follow our Boise State coverage on social media by liking us on Facebook and following us on Twitter.