Should Big 12 Take Inspiration From NBA Amid CFP Auto-Bid Discussions?
The landscape of college football is rapidly changing, and the effects it could have on the Big 12 are notable.
Last season, the College Football Playoff field expanded from four to 12 teams, leading to the longest and most interesting playoff yet. While premier conferences like the Big Ten and SEC earned a majority of the spots in the field, the Big 12 was left in the dust, earning only one spot.
Under this first iteration of the 12-team format, the five highest-ranked conference champions get a guaranteed spot in the playoff, with the four highest-ranked conference champions earning the top four seeds and a first-round bye. Changes will be coming over the next few seasons as college sports evolve across the board.
In a recent CBS Sports article, the Big 12 was the subject of speculation about how it might go forward in these discussions. Under a new proposed format, the playoff field could soon be comprised of almost exclusively automatic bids and make conference championship weekend a new experience. The new proposed format includes four automatic bids for both the SEC and Big Ten, two automatic bids for both the Big 12 and ACC, one automatic bid for a group of five team and one at-large bid for a 14-team field.
CBS suggested a couple of formats the Big 12 could use. One would involve going back to divisions, with the top four overall teams facing each other. And the other would simply be the same while keeping the conference divisionless. That format would involve the No. 1 team facing No. 4 and the No. 2 team facing No. 3, with the winner of each game heading to the playoff.
Although it would add another game to the slate, the Big 12 might be wise to take inspiration from the NBA’s play-in tournament. In the NBA, the seventh and eighth seed in each conference play for the seventh seed, while the ninth and tenth seed play in an elimination game. That is followed by the loser of the 7-8 game hosting the winner of the 9/10 game.
In conference championship format, that would effectively lead to the top two teams facing each other in a conference championship game with a playoff berth on the line. Then, the third and fourth-place teams could play against each other, with the winner advancing to a playoff play-in game against the loser of the conference championship a week later.
Last season, that would have looked like Arizona State playing Iowa State as the conference championship, with BYU facing Colorado in the 3-4 game. After Iowa State’s conference championship loss, it would have played the winner of BYU-Colorado, with the winner of that matchup securing the conference’s final playoff bid.
Effectively, this format gives the top two teams multiple chances to earn a playoff spot and forces third and fourth to win multiple games to make it in. While it seems unlikely this type of format would be implemented in college football, anything seems to be on the table in this era.
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Ivan is a sports media student at Oklahoma State University. He has covered OSU athletics since 2022 and also covers the OKC Thunder for Inside The Thunder and Thunderous Intentions.