1-AA conferences excluded from playoffs

[Newsbreaker]

Question for those of you who follow I-AA football nationally and historically more closely then I do...

Would a move to a 24 team field be a welcome one?

You're extending the season by one week. The top-8 seeds get a bye, teams 9-24 play each other, the winners facing the top-8, and away you go.

[uniwatcher]

Question for those of you who follow I-AA football nationally and historically more closely then I do...

Would a move to a 24 team field be a welcome one?

You're extending the season by one week. The top-8 seeds get a bye, teams 9-24 play each other, the winners facing the top-8, and away you go.

Not a bad idea, but with as few of teams as there are in IAA, I don't see it happening. An extra week would do nothing but weaken the argument for playoffs in football.

[Matt Trump]

Question for those of you who follow I-AA football nationally and historically more closely then I do...

Would a move to a 24 team field be a welcome one?

You're extending the season by one week. The top-8 seeds get a bye, teams 9-24 play each other, the winners facing the top-8, and away you go.

The argument for playoff expansion is there, but in all reality I don't think it would make a difference.

At this level, the cream always rises to the top in the playoffs. There historically aren't a lot of upsets in the playoffs leading up to the championship game. The team that has played the best throughout the season, won their conference, and earned a top 2 seed has usually made the big game and won. The seeding is set up to reward the teams with the best seasons to have a homefield advantage in the playoffs. The argument can be made as far as how they seed the teams and rank them, but adding more teams won't affect the top 4. I think there is a big difference between the top 8 in I-AA and the rest of the field. The teams that get "screwed" and don't get in usually wouldn't have made a difference anyway. I don't think Youngstown would have made the national championship game or won more than 1 playoff game last year.

[UNIAlum95]

Not a bad idea, but with as few of teams as there are in IAA, I don't see it happening. An extra week would do nothing but weaken the argument for playoffs in football.

There are 122 teams playing 1AA football. How is that worse than the 60+ teams out of 118 1A schools playing in a bowl game?

[Newsbreaker]

Matt, while I generally agree, we're only a couple years removed for a last-team-in (WKU) winning the NC.

In the system I detailed, you'd see a lot of movement in that first round, which would be a blast to watch and be a part of. Once you feed those top-8 back in, seeds would REALLY start to hold up, but I think an extra 8 teams would be a good addition.

[Matt Trump]

I'm not saying that an extra 8 teams wouldn't be a good thing, but I am saying it didn't make a difference.

In 2002, WKU was the co-champ with WIU. They were hardly the "last team in". They had 1 conference loss and that was to WIU. They were an elite team that year.

[Panthers to the Bone]

Another thing to consider is that 1-AA will probably add a 12th game to the schedule starting next season. If that's the case, the likelihood that playoff expansion would take place is minimal. It would push that national championship game back to around Christmas Day.

[PurpleCatFan]

They do this in DII. I also brought this up on the coach Farley show a year ago and he was in favor of it. It would generate some more excitement with additional teams getting in and being rewarded for a good season. It is tough to see an 8-3 team sitting at home or even a 7-4 with a loss to a D-1A school and being in a tough conference such as the Gateway when you see a D1A school getting a bowl bid with a six win season.

I remember an 8-3 Panther team sitting at home during the playoffs one year and they had player such as Berlin, Furrey, Meester, Setterstrom, Hannam on that team. Maybe with the 24 team format they get in. Who knows what would of happened if they would selected to he playoffs. Western Kentucky "last team in" won it and Youngstown State' last championship came without winning the Gateway.

[B.True]

if you go to 24 teams in the i-aa playoffs (which i would be for), you either play all the way until the championship game on December 21-23 or you start the season even earlier .... kinda long season, but it was a fun ride last year!

[TravelingPanther]

There's always going to be arguement for more and more expansion in the playoffs and NCAA B-ball tourney. You will always have the "last out" teams that whine.

[dragon]

DII has a 24 team playoff and the "last team in" for that was NW Missouri St and they made it to the title game and almost won it all. Sometimes a team might have some tough early losses and then gets hot but still misses or barely gets into the playoffs. It has happend to UNI before.