The College Bowl System is a truly an  “inexacting science”. A committee for each  meets using the records of the team, the “drawing power”, the rankings of the national writers, the location of the university vs location of bowls, the TV drawing power of the schools &/or their Head Coach.

…This is a wide range of Bowl games. They build up in importance as December unfolds. Most of us could care less about the so-called “minor” bowls in early December. Further, there are 41 Bowls!!! Is there 82 bowl deserving teams?

…The Bowls “build up” in importance starting on Dec 16 to Jan 1. The quality of teams, payouts to the teams,  “hoop-la” around the each bowl increases as the Bowl March begins on Dec 16. Since a huge chunck of the payout comes from the TV production, the networks have a significant voice in the matchups—especially in the earlier bowls where the teams are either large schools with mediocre records or smaller(in their relationship in the NCAA-Football world) schools with solid records.

… But…you can see from the 1^st  bowl date(Dec 16) that none of those teams playing on that date are “real” powerhouses”. It’s a football game to watch between 2 teams that seldom, if ever, compete against each other. Further, their team (school) gets on national TV.

…Traditionally, Jan 1 was ALWAYS a biggest bowl day… Cotton, Rose, Sugar, Orange Bowls all played on that day! They were the “Big Boys” of the Bowl Season. The Biggest Conferences had commitments to play there.The Big 10 Champion played Pacific Coast Champion in the Rose Bowl every year for years. .

…Jan 1 continues to be the “BIGGEST BOWL DAY” of the year. The format has been revised. Instead of each bowl having commitments from conferences, it is now part of the NCAA Championship Tournament. There are 2 games between the top 4 teams to decide the College Football Champion. The Winners of these bowls play on Jan 8 for the NCAA Championship.

…Mizzou (10-2) will be playing Ohio State(11-1) in the Cotton Bowl!  WOW!  That’s truly one of the major bowls. It’s a tremendous achievement for Coach Drinkwitz and the Tigers!! Ohio State is one of only a few a “brand name” schools with a HUGE reputation the USA. Mizzou, after a decade or so, of general mediocrity  has a tremendous year this year. A win against the Buckeyes will help Mizzou in many ways—it’ll really boost contributions from boosters; it’ll bring even more talented athletes to Columbia to play football; they’ll jump up dramatically in the eyes of the NCAA evaluators for future bowls.

…A special NCAA committee picked this Final 4 group of teams. There is ALWAYS unhappiness expressed by talented teams who are overlooked by the committee. But, this year a new precedent was established. For the 1^st time EVER, a team with the best performance in the USA went  undefeated team(13-0) was by-passed by the Committee!!

…Despite going 13-0 Florida State was bypassed by the committee. The Seminoles and their fans went biserk! They pointe out that they are the first undefeated team from a major Power-5 conference to be ever-be excluded from the playoffs since its inception in 2014. Why? Maybe some questioned the “toughness” of their schedule; maybe the ACC conference isn’t viewed as “big Time”, maybe an injury to their QB ? But the Seminoles overcame adversity. Florida State’s talented QB, Jordan Travis, DID suffer a severe leg injury on Nov 18 and is still unavailable to play. The Committee basically said that Florida State is NOT a top 4 team w/o that QB. Now to be fair, the committee does indicate that they consider injuries to all  key players.

…Further, the committee pushed up Alabama into that slot. Bama is ALWAYS a HUGE draw on the network. They hold a HUGE REPUTATION. That REPUATION draws huge viewing numbers – both LIVE & on the Tube. They win “big” every year in the SEC (a powerful NCAA conference) and have the most well-Known coach in college FB circles. Evey College football fan know of the REPUTAION OF Bama.

….As you can imagine, Florida State went biserk…I would too. They went 13-0 and couldn’t make the Final Four while every other D-1 Powerhouse had at least 1 loss?  Florida State cited some factors—some were legitimate, some not so much. 1) The CFP Chairman is Boo Corrigan. He is the Athletic Director @ N. Carolina State—a Florida State rival!!! Without Travis(suffered a broken leg), Florida State rallied in their next game against one of their biggest rivals-Florida. Backup Tate Rodemake led The Seminoles were 1^st in Points scored in the ACC & 1^st in the ACC in allowing point scored against them. They were 2^nd Punting (turning the field over). They led the ACC in SACKS. They beat 3 ranked teams. The Seminoles had to feel like that were strong in all facets of the game…not just QB.

…Even so, Florida State demonstrated depth @ the QB position by knocking off rival-Florida 24-15. In THAT game,2^nd stringer, Redshirt-Jr TAte Rodemaker made his 2^nd career start! Rodemaker averaged 11.2 yards per completion and did not have a turnover. Late in the game, more misfortune came Seminoles faced another key injury. Rodemakher suffered a concussion!! Sooo.. .For the

Atlantic Coast Conference Championship Game (ranked #4 at the time), the Seminoles were forced to use their 3^rd string QB. Brock Glen. Glen led The Seminoles to a victory over Louisville16-6 in the ACC Championship Game.  …Now you’re thinking…big deal…how good is Louisville? Which good teams did Louisville(10-3) beat?  Well how about Louisville beating Notre Dame 33-20 or #20  Duke 23-0? Sooo..that were  good wins for Florida State.

…It seemed that the committee wanted high viewer rankings. Bama, and their Reputation, ALWAYS brings in high TV rankings The more the viewers, the more$$ that the NCAA can ask for next year from the Networks. Does, that drive to make more money surpass the play of an unbeaten team? It also tells these very talented teams to “run it up” whenever you can against an over-matched opponent. Are the teams with long standing reputations supplanting the unbeaten teams?

…I’m in Florida State’s corner….what else could they do other than win every game? Sure, the injury hurts their offense but they do have a couple weeks to add new wrinkles to assist a less talented QB.

… Alabama holding a 12-1 record did win 3 of their games by only 3 points! Including a 3 point win over a 4-8 Arkansas team.  If going unbeaten isn’t good enough……with injuries (btw…which team doesn’t have injuries at this time of year?) what is good enough? Do you have to “run up” the score to impress the voters? Or play your defensive starters deep into one-sided games to keep shutouts?

…Well….sit back & enjoy the plethora of Bowl games. It is a chance to watch talented teams that you (or maybe just me) never see on the Tube. The Final year of the NCAA Final 4 in determining  It’s not an exact science has to which you game you watch 😊

….Thanks for your time & read!  YOUR reactions/comments are ALWAYS invited. Bob