Super Conference Realignment: "Pod Play"

80 teams, 4 super conferences, 4 pods per conference, and a revamped playoff system. Imagine a conference with Alabama, Florida State, Auburn, Clemson, Florida, South Carolina, Florida, Georgia, Miami, and Tennessee in it. That is my proposal for college football. Sure, this will probably never happen but we’re in the middle of the off-season and what else is a football nut like myself supposed to talk about? There has been plenty talk about potentially moving to four 16-team conferences, presumably with two 8-team divisions. I wanted to go in a different direction and explore “Pod Play.” There are several ways the scheduling could play out, but playing each team in your pod would give you 4 games. Then there would be the requirement to play at least 1 team from each of the other pods, which would create 3 more games. If we keep the 12 game schedule format that is currently in place there would be 5 games left to fill. At least 3 of the remaining games would have to be filled with other “Power 4” teams, but the other 2 could be smaller schools from outside of the super conferences. Here’s an example schedule for Clemson (Conferences Below): FSU (Pod 2) South Carolina (Pod 2) UNC (Pod 2) Duke (Pod 2) Florida (Pod 1) Kentucky (Pod 3) North Carolina State (Pod 4) Ole Miss (Central Pod 4) Maryland (Northern Pod 4) SMU (Central Pod 1) Georgia Southern (Non Power 4) Furman (Non Power 4) Assuming the scheduling works out without mapping out a schedule for each team, the playoff scenario is the biggest plus for “Pod Play.” The winner of each pod would be determined from the 7-game conference schedule (insert crazy tiebreaker rules here). Each pod would present a #1 and #2 seed that would play the opposite pods (Pod 1 vs. Pod 2 and Pod 3 vs. Pod 4). The #1 seed would play the #2 seed from the rival pod and winners square off against each other for the conference title. This gives us a two game playoff to determine the overall winner for each conference. At the conclusion of the conference championships, the four conference champions would go on to play in semifinal games similar to what we have in place now with the CFB Playoff system. What does this mean for bowl games? It means the fans and schools keep money in their pockets, rather than getting ripped off with travel costs. Locations of the conference playoff games could be hosted at neutral sites and take on brand affiliations, but I’d be tempted to have the higher seed host the first conference playoff game and then play the actual conference championship at a neutral site like we have now. Obviously the 2 semifinal games plus the national championship game would be played at designated locations such as the Rose Bowl, Orange Bowl, Sugar Bowl, etc. Some considerations that would need ironing out would obviously be which teams that aren’t in Power 5 conferences now would get the invite to join the Power 4. I included UCF, Boise State, BYU, SMU, Houston, Cincy, UConn, Air Force, Marshall, Utah State, Hawaii, SDSU, Nevada, Colorado State, and Fresno State. Also, the Western Conference pods are much weaker than the other groups, but based on geography alone that’s the way football talent just happens to shake out. Also, the fate of bowl games (aka $$$) would be a concerning issue, and is probably the main obstacle that would keep this type of system from ever happening. Another fallacy with this idea is what to do with the teams that finish with winning records, but don't qualify for the conference or CFB playoff system? Maybe a small number of bowl games are kept in place to allow for these teams to tack on an extra game, but the location and tie-ins are a conversation for another day. We can all dream though. Feel free to add your 2 cents in over on the Seldom Used Reserve forums. Southern Conference Pod 1 1. Florida 2. Georgia 3. Miami 4. Georgia Tech 5. **Central Florida Pod 2 1. Florida State 2. Clemson 3. South Carolina 4. North Carolina 5. Duke Pod 3 1. Alabama 2. Auburn 3. Louisville 4. Kentucky 5. Wake Forest Pod 4 1. Tennessee 2. Virginia Tech 3. North Carolina State 4. Virginia 5. Vanderbilt Central Conference Pod 1 1. Oklahoma 2. Oklahoma State 3. TCU 4. Nebraska 5. **SMU Pod 2 1. Texas 2. Texas A&M 3. Kansas State 4. Kansas 5. **Houston Pod 3 1. LSU 2. Arkansas 3. Baylor 4. Texas Tech 5. **Air Force Pod 4 1. Ole Miss 2. Mississippi State 3. West Virginia 4. Missouri 5. **Marshall Northern Conference Pod 1 1. Ohio State 2. Michigan 3. Minnesota 4. Indiana 5. Purdue Pod 2 1. Notre Dame 2. Michigan State 3. Illinois 4. Rutgers 5. **Cincy Pod 3 1. Wisconsin 2. Iowa 3. Iowa State 4. Northwestern 5. **UConn Pod 4 1. Penn State 2. Pittsburgh 3. Maryland 4. Boston College 5. Syracuse Western Conference Pod 1 1. Stanford 2. California 3. Utah 4. **Utah State 5. **Hawaii Pod 2 1. Southern Cal 2. UCLA 3. **BYU 4. **San Diego State 5. **Nevada Pod 3 1. Oregon 2. Oregon State 3. Washington 4. Washington State 5. **Boise State Pod 4 1. Arizona 2. Arizona State 3. Colorado 4. **Colorado State 5. **Fresno State