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The original was posted on /r/cfb by /u/horn_em on 2023-11-19 17:29:25.

There have been conflicting reports about whether Texas has clinched a spot in the Big 12 Championship Game. It is that Texas will get the #1 seed with a win against Texas Tech and will retain a berth under many scenarios even with a loss. But can we come up with a scenario in which Texas gets left out?

By literal interpretation of the rules, even including the conference’s conflicting mid-season “clarification”, the answer appears to be no. But wait, if the conference is willing to contradict itself mid-season, is there a way it could reinterpret things again to make the answer yes? Sure, why not! Let’s play it out.

Let’s recap how we got here. The official Big 12 tiebreaker rules unfortunately include this dumb clause about how to handle ties between 3 or more teams:

Head-to-head (best cumulative win percentage in games among the tied teams). If not, every tied team has played each other, go to step 2.

Let’s disregard, the misplaced comma. This allows a counterintuitive scenario where a team that is 2-0 against the other teams in a 3-way tie may not advance simply because the other two teams have not played each other. We can all agree that would be terrible, right? So the Big 12 decided to clarify:

If all the tied teams are not common opponents, the tied team that defeated each of the other tied teams earns the championship berth. There have been no changes to any rules regarding Big 12 Football tiebreaker procedures

Well, yes, that is clearly a change that conflicts with the rule above. But hey, it’s a good change, so we’ll allow it.

Hold up though - what if there isn’t a team that has defeated “each of the other tied teams” but there is a team that has the best record against tied teams? Specifically, what if…

  • OSU wins to finish 7-2 with wins over OU and KSU (Texas not played)
  • Texas loses to finish 7-2 with a win over KSU and a loss to OU (OSU not played)
  • OU wins to finish 7-2 with a win over Texas and a loss to OSU (KSU not played)
  • KSU wins to finish 7-2 with losses to OSU and Texas (OU not played)

Because no team has played each of the other tied teams, neither the official rules nor the midseason clarification say that head-to-head record applies here - and in fact the official rules say that it does not. And intuitively, it’s not at all obvious that it *should* apply, because if the missing games were played, teams that lose the tie would have the opportunity to break the tie in their own favor.

But if the Big 12 does choose to reinterpret the rules again in this way, then OSU would advance with the #1 seed due to their 2-0 record against tied teams (Texas and OU are 1-1, KSU is 0-2). The rules would then be reapplied to the three-way tie between Texas, OU, and KSU. OU would advance at 1-0 (win over Texas), which beats Texas’ 1-1 (loss to OU, win over KSU) and KSU’s 0-1 (loss to Texas).

Clearly, this interpretation would be… objectionable. Should OSU advance over Texas without a head-to-head win? And should 1-0 OU advance over 1-1 Texas without having played KSU? It’s a stretch to say the existing rules support this, but it will be up to the conference to decide. When the commissioner is publicly rooting against Texas, anything is possible!