What we've learned from two years of the College Football Playoff
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Choosing the four teams for the College Football Playoff is one of the most subjective, ambiguous processes of determining a national champion in all of college sports.
That is, unless you follow the selection committee's 11 commandments.
Believe it or not, there's a method to the madness. There is protocol to be followed, and now there is two years of data to be analyzed. You want in, TCU? Michigan? LSU? Pay attention.
The committee says thou shalt ...
1. Play a challenging schedule
The committee wants to know whom you beat. It's that simple. One of the biggest justifications for their weekly rankings has been wins over top-25 opponents and wins against teams with records of .500 or better. It's why the Big Ten no longer schedules FCS teams and has gone to a nine-game league format. It's why Week 1 features four matchups between two ranked teams. Teams aren't penalized for a "good loss" (see: Notre Dame at Clemson last year) but also aren't rewarded for FCS wins (looking at you, North Carolina).
"One of the top criteria we have in our rankings is strength of schedule. We look at all of those things. I know when we're comparing schools or looking at schools, we throw it right up on the screen: who'd they play, what their opponents' records were. That's very important -- your quality wins." -- CFP committee member Barry Alvarez
2. Win your conference
Nowhere does it say specifically teams have to win a conference championship game (Oklahoma didn't need one last year), but there is heavy weight given to that so-called "13th data point," which was the very reason Ohio State finished in the top four in 2014. The Buckeyes' romp of Wisconsin was exactly what it needed to sneak into the top four for the first time all season, pushing the Big 12 out. A conference title is used to help the committee members choose between comparable teams. It's why Michigan State bumped Iowa out of the top four last year and why it jumped Oklahoma in the final ranking.
"I think that win over that highly ranked team added to the rest of their body of work caused Michigan State to be ranked ahead of Oklahoma." -- Former committee chairman Jeff Long on Dec. 6, 2015
3. Lose early, not late
Nobody within the CFP will concede this publicly, but by the nature of the sport, a November loss is far more damaging than one in September. Ask the Buckeyes, who suffered a devastating Nov. 21 loss to Michigan State last year, or Stanford, which won the Pac-12 but couldn't overcome that Nov. 14 home loss to Oregon. Or Notre Dame, which was eliminated with a Nov. 28 loss to Stanford.
4. Win the head-to-head debate
See: TCU vs. Baylor. For committee members who wrestled with which Big 12 co-champ was better in 2014, the protocol helped guide them, as it says that head-to-head results should be used to help rank comparable teams. That could come into play this year with teams like Florida State and Clemson or LSU and Alabama.
"TCU went behind Baylor because I think people when they voted took into account finally the head-to-head. People would say why don't you take the head-to-head during the season? Because at that point, there are games that are being played, and one team's schedule might be significantly more challenging than another team's schedule, but once you've been through playing the whole conference slate and you're on even footing, and that's when you have to get it right." -- Former committee member Mike Tranghese
5. Pass the eye test
OK, so there's a wee bit of subjectivity in this system, but if you don't impress the five former coaches in the room, odds are the rest of the committee isn't impressed, either. Alabama lost at home to Ole Miss last year but was still one of the committee's top four teams based in large part on its strength of schedule (see No. 1 on this list) and simply how good it looked.
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