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The original was posted on /r/cfb by /u/legalexperiments on 2024-11-27 01:46:07+00:00.

As we have all heard and discussed, the CFP committee has said that they will not “punish” teams that lose in their conference championship games. However, the committee have also suggested that the winners of championship games will be rewarded.

Many here and on the internets seem to think this means that a team that plays in a conference championship game can never drop in rankings. But you can’t reward teams that win and always expect the teams to lose to stay put in the rankings.

Here’s what I hope (I actually don’t believe the committee will stick to their stated principles) the basic formula is:

  • If you WIN a conference championship game, your record is now stronger than it was, so you should (if justified) be able to move in front of any team in front of you, whether they (a) won a championship game, (b) lost a championship game, or © didn’t play in a championship game.
  • If you LOSE a conference championship game, your record should be considered unchanged, so you should only move back if a team behind you (a) won a championship game (in a manner that justifies them moving in front of you) or (b) lost a championship game (in a manner that justifies them moving in front of you, which is unlikely unless you got blown out). In other words, you cannot be jumped by any teams that didn’t also play in a championship game, regardless of how badly you lost your championship game.

Example: Let’s assume that the rankings are where they currently are going into conference championship weekend. Let’s also assume that Boise St. (rank 11), Clemson (12), and ASU (14) make their respective championship games but Alabama (13) does not. If Boise St. loses the MWC championship by 30 points, Clemson loses their game by 1 point, and ASU wins their game by 30 points, Boise St. can be (and probably should be) jumped by Clemson and ASU but they can’t be jumped by Alabama.

Again, this is all probably for naught, because the committee is just gonna do what they want, but having a policy that teams who play in the conference championship will not be punished but ALSO allowing for them to drop in the rankings are not inconsistent positions.