Now that the college football season is over with Clemson thrashing Alabama in the National Championship Game the speculation about next year’s season can begin. I am not a football expert by any means. I played a couple years in my youth and have, like a lot of people, spent a large portion of my lifetime in front of a TV watching the game. And yet somehow this qualifies me to be an expert on the game, which it really doesn’t. At best, like most Americans, it gives me the right to an opinion.
What really intrigued me about this year’s college football season was not that Clemson and Alabama played in the title game. I think that was a no brainier even for me to pick. My interest was with two other undefeated teams. One was fourth-ranked Notre Dame and the other was the University of Central Florida.
As far as I can tell a selection committee makes that determination. Probably a group of intellectual types similar to the group that decided whether Plato is or is not a planet. Is Pluto a Power 9 planet or a dwarf planet now relegated to sub status among our solar system’s celestial players. The question, I would assume, is UCF a Power 5 team–a dwarf planet or a fast radio burst from a distant galaxy? Or is it a team that just toils in the distant corner of our own little football galaxy. They play in a non-elite conferences that is just not that good. I guess the they are a quick look shooting star.
The fate of UCF post season play is determined by a 13 member selection committee. A committee consisting of sharp-minded experts in the science of football. Members include former football head coaches, athletic directors and even a sports journalist and a former Secretary of State. They serve for three years determining which four college football teams get to play for the National Championship.
According to various websites, the selection committee forms its hypotheses based on observations and by gathering data through the 12 game regular season. They also make their picks on team records, head-to-head results and strength of schedules. Plus, they will compare how teams did against common opponents; and of course, the all powerful conference championships factor in.
The thing to remember is that not all schedules, records and conferences are created equal. But when are 12-0 records not equal? The American egalitarian belief of equality does not fully play out on the gridiron. To make it easier, I would assume, College Football has 10 major conferences but only five power elites, which almost automatically eliminates a large percentage of the more than 100 college football teams around the country. And rightfully so, but this gives the power elites a foot up on teams, like UCF, who do not play in these elite conferences.
It is here, in my mind, where Notre Dame and UCF pass some sort of orbital plane. Both teams have an arrogance in pushing their claims to playing in the championship. Notre Dame has a storied and rich College Football history that must hold some sort of sway on current football minds. UCF, however, not so much. UCF did not come into existence until 1963. By then Notre Dame had already won five National Championships.
But the college football world changed in 1990 when most major independent schools like Penn State, Florida State and the University of Miami began joining conference as College Football moved towards a playoff system to determine what teams qualified to play in the championship. But not Notre Dame. They are special. They are loosely affiliated with the Atlantic Coast Conference, a Power 5 but not completely bound an ACC schedule.
But watching them play is like star gazing. Going out at night and looking at distant twinkling lights. We are use to light being instantaneous but the light from our nearest star, Alpha Centauri takes more than four light years to get here. The Sun’s light takes about eight minutes. When we watch Notre Dame play is like we are watching football from the past. It is the Four Horseman led by Knute Rockne running loose in the 1920’s. College Football has moved on yet Notre Dame is still playing to its past glory.
Then there is the University of Central of Florida. A school founded in Orlando. The land of Mickey Mouse and Shamu the Whale. A not so special football school, despite being the largest university in the state of Florida. It is bursting out of the shadow of Disney World. UCF is a team that has basically a protostar, a mass of swirling football nebulae. It has gone from a winless season to two undefeated regular seasons. This burst of light has created a Pluto type argument among football scholars. Is UCF a supernova team from a non-power five conference, a real contender?
Unlike astronomers and astrophysicists, who deal with the cosmos and an infinite number of stars, football minds really have to observe a handful of teams throughout the season. At some point this gridiron group will have to translate their observations and data into a working theory that other football aficionados will believe. Much like the way Newton turned gravity from a theory to a law: what goes up must come down.
All stars over time eventually implode and so do football teams. Notre Dame’s recent 33-3 loss to Clemson in the Cotton Bowl is the most recent a example of it’s Bowl season’s implosion. Then there was their 42-14 implosion to Alabama in the title game in 2013. But they have not gone supernova. Notre Dame is like a low-mass star with plenty of life left in it but maybe not enough to outshine newer teams like UCF. Notre Dame has been around for a while and it knows it will shine brighter if it is the only star in the non-conference sky. It’s luminosity will be dimmer by several magnitudes if it has to toil as an upper-middle of the pack Power 5 conference team.
UCF, on the other hand, realizes that in order to get the selection committee to take them seriously they have to burn brighter and play with more intensity now. But like Notre Dame, if they were to join a Power 5 conference they might find themselves a 6-6 team struggling to be bowl eligible. Instead, they play in the back corner of the football universe, the American Athletic Conference, a non Power 5 conference where it might be easier to reel off 25 straight wins. Alabama reeled off 14 straight wins playing in the Southeastern Conference, arguably the best conference despite Clemson’s beat down.
The problem is that UCF had its moment much like Notre Dame. They both fizzled in their bowl losses. Although UCF’ played in an exciting game with LSU, a Power 5 team, and despite the 40-32 score, it was not really that close. But then neither was the National Championship game.
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