The strong have preyed upon the weak for the entirety of human history, and college football is no different. In fact, the current structure (or lack thereof) within the sport might be the ultimate dog-eat-dog power structure we have in society today.
We're now 40 years removed from the last so-called mid-major (BYU in 1984) to win a college football national championship, something that is: A) highly unlikely to be repeated in today's world of a 12-team tournament, and B) took a unique set of circumstances to pull off even back then.
But in hearing Chad Holbrook speak, it struck me that we're in for a different type of controversy in college football starting this winter.
Holbrook is the head baseball coach at the College of Charleston, who was snubbed of a bid to the NCAA Tournament on Monday. C of C went 41-14 on the season, 21-5 in conference play, but was not offered a bid to the tournament.
"I know I should take the high road a little bit more than I'm taking it right now, but I'll fall on the sword for my players," Holbrook said, fighting back tears. "They deserve better. We work 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and to have someone in a room that hasn't seen us play tell us we're not good enough is asinine to me."
In non-conference play, C of C was swept by Big Ten champion Nebraska, but won a series over Ivy League champion Penn and over SoCon champion Wofford. The only other tournament team C of C faced was UNC-Wilmington, who beat Charleston twice in the Colonial Athletic Association tournament and ultimately stole C of C's bid to the tourney. This is the ultimate chicken-egg conundrum for mid-majors in every sport: selection committees across sports uniformly leave them out because their schedules aren't "tough" enough, but power conference teams won't play them because they're too good.
The consequence of being the NCAA's 65th best team is especially dire in baseball, who does not have bowl games or an NIT for the best of the rest to play in. You're either in the field or you're done.
Even still, C of C's RPI came in at 42nd nationally, ahead of five power conference teams (plus James Madison) that netted at-large bids. And that doesn't include Alabama, Florida, LSU, South Carolina, and Vanderbilt -- all of whom were granted bids despite going 13-17 in SEC play. Bama, LSU, South Carolina and Vandy even nabbed 2-seeds in their respective regionals.
"I was a coach that got fired for going 13-17. I know what a mediocre regular season is, that many teams that got in had," Holbrook said. "We had a phenomenal regular season, and it was ignored. There are teams that got in today that probably sent their players home because they knew they didn't deserve to be in. Our kids were denied a chance to keep playing. 28-5 in their last 33, won the regular season (conference championship). The regular season doesn't matter. Oh, (NCAA selection committee chairman Matt Hogue) said it did matter, but now it doesn't matter when it comes to College of Charleston? I'm at a loss."
Wow.
— Scott Eisberg (@SEisbergWCIV) May 27, 2024
Talk about an emotional Chad Holbrook.
He's simply brought to tears by today's decision to leave CofC out of the NCAA Tournament.
"I was a coach that got fired for going 13-17. I know what a mediocre regular season is that many teams that got in had." pic.twitter.com/gKhy8wpOrs
Holbrook was fired at South Carolina after going 13-17 in SEC play and missing the tournament in 2017. In six seasons at C of C, his teams are 102-50 in CAA play and have yet to make the NCAA Tournament.
Again, a power conference also-ran receiving an NCAA Tournament bid at the expense of a mid-major regular season champion is a tale as old as the NCAA Tournament, no matter the sport. And it will now become an annual bug (feature?) of the college football experience as well.
Let's forward to this fall. Florida plays what many expect to be the toughest schedule in college football history, facing No. 1 Georgia, No. 3 Texas, No. 6 Ole Miss, No. 11 Florida State, No. 14 LSU and No. 15 Tennessee -- six top 15 teams, five of them in succession to close the regular season. If Billy Napier's team goes 4-2 in those six, they are deservedly getting in the 12-team field. They're even in at 3-3. But what if they go 2-4?
The 12-team format will reserve one spot for the highest-ranked Group of 5 champion, and the unspoken implication is that only one G5 champion will get in. Let's say Liberty goes 12-0 again and earns the reserved G5 bid. Who gets an at-large bid, 11-1 Memphis or 8-4 Florida? What about, gasp, an 11-2 Utah team that loses the Big 12 championship or an 8-4 Florida?
Who are we even kidding? We all know the Gators are getting in.
The argument in favor of the Gators is that they would have endured a schedule much tougher than the hypothetical Tigers or Utes. But the Tigers' and Utes' argument -- echoed by hundreds of snubbed teams before them -- is that the power structure of the sport doesn't give them an opportunity to play an equal number of top-level teams that Florida faces. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy. If the SEC has 11 "tournament caliber" teams, well, is it any wonder that the SEC's 11th-place team gets a bid?
I know, I know. I'm not telling you anything you haven't seen for yourself as long as you've followed the basketball and baseball tournaments. And now it's coming to football, starting this December.