CFP committee will place more emphasis on strength of schedule

The College Football Playoff selection committee announced Wednesday it will place more emphasis on strength of schedule this year when determining which teams make the 12-team field.

The committee said in a statement that the schedule strength metric has been adjusted to apply greater weight to games against strong opponents. An additional metric, record strength, has been added to go beyond a team’s schedule strength to assess how a team performed against that schedule.

“This metric rewards teams defeating high-quality opponents while minimizing the penalty for losing to such a team,” the committee said. “Conversely, these changes will provide minimal reward for defeating a lower-quality opponent while imposing a greater penalty for losing to such a team.”

The adjustment to the evaluation process comes after some in the Southeastern Conference complained about last season’s inclusion of — at the time of selections — an 11-2 SMU of the Atlantic Coast Conference over a 9-3 Alabama or even a 9-3 South Carolina or 9-3 Mississippi.

SMU’s losses were to an unranked BYU and a ranked Clemson in the ACC championship game. Alabama had bad losses against Vanderbilt and Oklahoma, both .500 at the time, but also had wins over a second-ranked Georgia, No. 21 Missouri, and No. 14 LSU.

Prompted by concerns about how teams that don’t play in conference championship games are judged, the committee reviewed the movement of idle teams from the second-to-last ranking to the final ranking. The selection committee reaffirmed that movement in the final week should be evidence-based and did not recommend creating a formal policy prohibiting such movement.

The committee also updated its policy on recusal of selection committee members.

A member will be fully recused from the evaluation of a team if he or she receives direct compensation from the school in question or has an immediate family member who is a football player, football staff member, or senior administrator at the school. A fully recused member is not allowed to participate in any deliberations or vote concerning that school.

A member will be partially recused if he or she has a secondary relationship with the school in question, such as an immediate family member employed by the institution but outside of the football program or senior administration. A partially recused member may remain present and participate in discussions related to the team in question, but is not allowed to participate in votes involving the team.

The selection committee will release its five weekly Top 25 rankings on Nov. 4. The final rankings and playoff field will be announced Dec. 7.

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