A Big Shift in College Football Gets Underway Friday

It took more than 100 years, a few billion dollars, and the cold, hard realization that you can't fight progress forever. The first 12-team College Football Playoff kicks off Friday and Saturday with four first-round games. The tournament concludes Jan. 20 with the national title game in Atlanta, per the AP.

• First games: Texas hosts Clemson, Penn State hosts SMU, Notre Dame hosts Indiana, and Ohio State hosts Tennessee.
• Winners advance: The winners go on to play over the New Year's holiday—Arizona State, Boise State, Georgia, and Oregon secured byes and are waiting.

• Origins: The AP details the long history of trying to pick a college champion, beginning with the Rose Bowl in 1902 and the evolution of bowl games. In the 1990s, a two-decade period of systems—the Bowl Alliance, Bowl Coalition, and Bowl Championship Series—tried to pair the two best teams in the country to play for the title. Rankings were based on a combination of polls, computer rankings, and strength of schedule—a formula that has been tweaked many times but remains a sore spot to this day. The Bowl Championship Series turned into the College Football Playoff in 2014 with a four-team postseason. This year, for the first time, 12 teams are playing.
• Will this work? One issue is travel—how many fans can afford to go to three neutral-site games to watch their team chase a championship? The eventual champion will also end up playing 16 or 17 games, carving into classroom time that's supposed to still mean something at the college level. Within a year or two, this tournament will likely expand to 14 teams. The issue of "access"—which conferences get in and how many teams they're allowed—will top that debate.

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