The Big 12 Conference created a model where it wanted to separate itself from the pack and in the end, it left it on the outside looking in.
The conference’s two best teams — Baylor and TCU — were left out of the College Football Playoff just five days after TCU ascended to No. 3 and looked primed for a playoff spot.
But College Football Playoff committee chairman Jeff Long said Ohio State, which whooped Wisconsin in the Big Ten title game, had an impressive showing that vaulted it over both Big 12 teams.
In the end, it all came down to that pivotal 13th game, a championship game, something the Big 12 Conference refused to have when it decided to stand pat with 10 conference teams instead of expanding while all the power conferences around it were doing so.
Commissioner Bob Bowlsby acknowledged that the Big 12 screwed up not only with its decision to not have a conference title game, but also with its nonconference scheduling. He also said he wished he had known that the lack of a 13th game was going to be a factor in the College Football Playoff. If he had, he said, the Big 12 might have addressed the problem before it became a problem.
“It's clear that we were penalized for not having a postseason championship game,” Bowlsby said in an interview with ESPN. “And it would have been nice to had been told that ahead of time. Because we made the impression that this was — we had a different model, but it wasn't one that was going to penalize us. And I think it's clear that it did, and I think it was even said that it did. So that will cause us to go back to the drawing board a little bit, talk about whether or not we need to think about a different model.”
The Big 12 has applied for a waiver to have a conference title game without the requisite 12 teams, which would keep the Big 12 out of the expansion fray. But Bowlsby knows that solution might not be good enough and the conference might have to seek two teams to brings its numbers to 12 and create divisions.
But let’s be clear, this isn’t just about not having a conference title game or having co-champions in Baylor and TCU, it’s also about the way the Big 12 approached the past few weeks. The infighting, the trading of barbs in the media, the hiring of a PR firm and, perhaps most damning of all, Bowlsby’s awkward and backwards assertion that the league’s motto of “One True Champion” could still apply to co-champions.
Today's disappointment was actually rooted years ago when the landscape of college football changed and the Big 12 refused to change with it. The conference lost four teams to three different conferences and, for a variety of reasons, decided to stubbornly stand pat with the 10 teams that pledged their allegiance to the conference.
There were several teams itching to get into the Big 12 at that time and there still will be should the conference decide to make additions, but its clear that in an effort to be progressive with its “One True Champion” model, the Big 12 really just showed that it wasn’t fully ready to embrace the future of college football.
And the future is the playoff, and the Big 12 is already watching the first one from home.
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Graham Watson is the editor of Dr. Saturday on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email her at dr.saturday@ymail.com or follow her on Twitter! Follow @YahooDrSaturday
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