Faculty soccer is increasing to a 12-team Faculty Soccer Playoff for the 2024 and 2025 seasons. After a long time upon a long time of the polls deciding the nationwide champion (1936-1991) and early futile makes an attempt at making a nationwide championship recreation just like the Bowl Coalition (1992-1994) and the Bowl Alliance (1995-1997), the Bowl Championship Collection was born. The BCS lasted from 1998 to 2013, when the Faculty Soccer Playoff was launched and the four-team CFP mannequin caught for a decade (2014-2023).
Now, the CFP will function twelve groups with 5 computerized bids for the 5 highest-ranked convention champions. The highest 4 of these champions will get a first-round bye (probably the SEC, Massive Ten, ACC and Massive 12 champs). The seven at-large groups and the fifth convention champion (in all probability coming from the Group of 5) might be seeded 5 by means of 12, rounding out the sector with the primary spherical of video games.
It’s but to be seen how the Playoff Committee will stability groups with higher data coming from simpler conferences just like the Massive 12 and ACC in opposition to groups with worse data coming from tougher conferences just like the Massive 10 and SEC. One school soccer analyst, nevertheless, believes that the Oklahoma Sooners’ new league might be well-represented come December.
On3’s Andy Staples gave ten of his predictions for the 2024 Faculty Soccer Season. Among the many most notable was that the SEC would get 5 of the twelve spots within the new expanded CFP.
“It’s not apples to apples as a result of you possibly can’t simply port Texas or Oklahoma playoff appearances to the SEC due to how the automated bids work and since we don’t know if these groups would have had a distinct file taking part in in a distinct league, however seven groups that might be within the SEC in 2024 (Texas, Alabama, Georgia, Ole Miss, Missouri, LSU, Oklahoma) completed within the prime 13 final season,” Staples mentioned. “The No. 12 group is probably going getting kicked for the highest-ranked Group of 5 champ, however the energy conferences are so huge now that the champions of all 4 probably will end within the prime 11. That might preserve anybody else from getting punted.”
Staples additionally backed up his prediction by touting the sheer competitors that SEC groups will face each single week.
“The SEC’s schedule draw is the most important cause for this prediction,” Staples mentioned. “Alabama and Georgia bought more durable convention schedules, however they’re additionally proficient sufficient to deal with them. Texas and Ole Miss seem to have CFP-caliber rosters and pretty manageable schedules. Missouri and Tennessee is probably not good, however they’re going to be good and so they fared properly within the schedule draw. Oklahoma and LSU are Oklahoma and LSU; they’re nearly at all times a menace to win double-digit video games. That’s a number of official contenders, and it’s completely cheap that five-eighths of that group might end within the prime 11.”
Staples’ feedback are felt by many within the new SEC footprint, hoping that the depth and aggressive nature of the league might be rewarded.
For instance, ought to a 9-3 SEC group with three shut losses to playoff-caliber groups be ignored in favor of a 10-2 ACC group that hasn’t performed the identical general stage of competitors? That’s the reply that Oklahoma and SEC followers are ready for the committee to reply for the primary time this winter.
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Story initially appeared on Sooners Wire
