2016 Death to the BCS Playoffs: Week 12 Mock Bracket

With the chaotic part of the week out of the way, it's time to sort through the craziness and establish a pecking order.

The D-III playoffs saw chalk advance, and a battle for the fate of the universe will take place in Naperville on Saturday as North Central gets a rematch with Wheaton in Round 2. Meanwhile, several teams are still fighting at the FBS level for conference championships and a berth in the Death to the BCS Playoffs.

This is a concept created by Dan Wetzel, Josh Peter, and Jeff Passan several years ago, where instead of the BCS nonsense or the slightly improved, but in their eyes not quite there College Football Playoff, the Death to the BCS Playoff system is a 16 team field where every conference champion gets an automatic bid, and the rest of the field is filled with at large berths. The field is then seeded 1-16, with home field advantage given to the higher seeds in the first three rounds.

I credit them for this because it was originally their idea. They wanted a selection committee to select the teams and seedings. I've chosen for a few years to take their system and fill the field based on a little bit of the eye test on my part, as well as some metrics chosen to help remove any bias I may have. You will see listed after each team in this field a set of stats. I use Non-Conference Schedule Strength (NCSS), First Degree (PP1), Second Degree (PP2), and Adjusted Playoff Points (aPP) as well as computer rankings compiled by Jeff Sagarin (SAG), the late David Rothman (ROTH), and the website All My Sports Teams Suck (AMSTS), and organically combine all of these to build that 16 team field.

So without further ado, let's build a mock playoff field.

1. Alabama (11-0, SEC "Champion")- NCSS: 3, PP1: 63, PP2: 26.73, aPP: 63, SAG: 1, ROTH: 1, AMSTS: 1. (LW: 1)
2. Ohio State (10-1, At Large)- NCSS: 5, PP1: 58, PP2: 23.40, aPP: 56, SAG: 2, ROTH: 3, AMSTS: 2. (LW: 2)
3. Michigan (10-1, Big Ten "Champion")- NCSS: 4, PP1: 56, PP2: 22.00, aPP: 52, SAG: 3, ROTH: 2, AMSTS: 3. (LW: 4)
4. Clemson (10-1, ACC "Champion")- NCSS: 3, PP1: 60, PP2: 25.50, aPP: 56, SAG: 4, ROTH: 7, AMSTS: 4. (LW: 3)
5. Washington (10-1, Pac 12 "Champion")- NCSS: 2, PP1: 42, PP2: 15.90, aPP: 39, SAG: 5, ROTH: 4, AMSTS: 5. (LW: 6)
6. Oklahoma (9-2, Big XII "Champion")- NCSS: 4, PP1: 43, PP2: 16.67, aPP: 40, SAG: 7, ROTH: 14, AMSTS: 11. (LW: 11)
7. Western Michigan (11-0, MAC "Champion")- NCSS: 6, PP1: 42, PP2: 13.45, aPP: 42, SAG: 22, ROTH: 12, AMSTS: 7. (LW: 7)
8. Wisconsin (9-2, At Large)- NCSS: 4, PP1: 44, PP2: 16.75, aPP: 42, SAG: 8, ROTH: 5, AMSTS: 6. (LW: 8)
9. Louisville (9-2, At Large)- NCSS: 5, PP1: 41, PP2: 16.33, aPP: 38, SAG: 6, ROTH: 13, AMSTS: 9. (LW: 5)
10. Boise State (10-1, At Large)- NCSS: 8, PP1: 50, PP2: 15.80, aPP: 47, SAG: 32, ROTH: 22, AMSTS: 12. (LW: 9)
11. Nebraska (9-2, At Large)- NCSS: 4, PP1: 42, PP2: 17.11, aPP: 39, SAG: 30, ROTH: 10, AMSTS: 14. (LW: 12)
12. Houston (9-2, At Large)- NCSS: 5, PP1: 44, PP2: 17.67, aPP: 36, SAG: 25, ROTH: 23, AMSTS: 16. (LW: NR)
13. Wyoming (8-3, Mountain West "Champion")- NCSS: 5, PP1: 44, PP2: 19.50, aPP: 30, SAG: 75, ROTH: 49, AMSTS: 29. (LW: NR)
14. Temple (8-3, American Athletic "Champion")- NCSS: 4, PP1: 34, PP2: 13.63, aPP: 23, SAG: 43, ROTH: 44, AMSTS: 37. (LW: 15)
15. Louisiana Tech (8-3, Conference USA "Champion")- NCSS: 7, PP1: 30, PP2: 13.00, aPP: 15, SAG: 61, ROTH: 71, AMSTS: 49. (LW: 16)
16. Arkansas State (6-4, Sun Belt "Champion")-  NCSS: 5, PP1: 27, PP2: 14.83, aPP: 10, SAG: 79, ROTH: 86, AMSTS: 67. (LW: NR)

Out of the playoffs: Washington State (10), Troy (13), San Diego State (14)

Photo by Leon Halip (Getty Images)

This took a little time to settle the exact order, but the field itself wasn't too hard to seed, though I had a tougher time narrowing down the final at large bids. Fortunately the top of the field was not difficult to set up. Alabama, despite Nick Saban being a coward, is far and away the best team in the country, agreed on by pretty much all metrics. The other team getting three home games was a little tricky, but Ohio State is second in almost everything, so they get the #2 seed over Michigan, though that will get settled this coming week. Clemson, now that they've evened up their conference record with Louisville and possess the tiebreaker, get the #4 seed and a second home game.

Photo by Ben Queen (USA TODAY Sports)

Washington bounced back following its loss to USC and move up a spot from last week. The big jumper for the week is Oklahoma. After not having a signature win on their resume, their victory over West Virginia completely changed the complexion of their season and now has them hosting in the first round. Western Michigan stands pat at the #7 seed at 11-0, and Wisconsin, thanks to their higher Playoff Points totals and wins over a playoff team in Nebraska, get the final first round home game.

Photo by Nati Harnik (AP)

Louisville's fall stops in Madison. I initially had them in at #8, but had to flip them with Wisconsin, as the Cardinals' best win is over Florida State, who isn't in the conversation for the playoffs. This gives us a mid major matchup and the Battle of the Broncos in the 7-10 matchup as Boise State drops a spot due to no real fault of their own. Nebraska remains moves up to #11, despite a win over Wyoming who is responsible for Boise State's lone defeat, because of Boise's better Playoff Point numbers. We also get a renewal of the old Nebraska-Oklahoma rivalry in the first round this way. Houston, after being on the cusp of the playoffs since they dropped their first game, finally breaks through with that huge win over Louisville. This is another game where I'm ignoring head to head results, but they aren't rematching, and Louisville has the aforementioned strong win over Florida State to help their cause.

Photo by Blaine McCartney (Wyoming Tribune Eagle)

We round it out with our four remaining conference champions. After dropping out last week, Wyoming makes a triumphant return with a win over San Diego State. I feel like the Sagarin rankings are a little too low for the Cowboys, but they are easily the best conference champion remaining. We drop down a spot to Temple, who gets the auto bid based on a head to head win over South Florida, while Navy, who would be contending for this spot, got beat by the Bulls, so the tie between division leaders goes to the Owls. You can see the huge drop off though after Wyoming as Temple has significantly fewer Playoff Points. And now, Louisiana Tech finally gets out of the guillotine in the #16 seed after Arkansas State beat Troy to take the Sun Belt lead. The Red Wolves are easily the worst team in the auto qualifying group, and get rewarded in this mock with a trip to Alabama.

Photo by Andy Cross (The Denver Post)

The trick with this mock came in trying to decide my at large teams. Colorado was easily my first team out. They were right in the mix with the other 9-2 at large teams, but when I was parsing resumes to have to eliminate one, the Buffaloes have the weakest one. Their best win is over Washington State, but that's not quite as good as, say, Louisville's over Florida State, while every other school in the conversation has a win over another playoff team. Navy has to be considered in the mix as well, though they could possibly get the American Athletic auto bid before the Army game and I have to debate whether to build my bracket with that game in consideration or not. Florida is probably slightly ahead of them though as the SEC East winner at 8-2 and being right in the mix on most metrics.

I have to mention this again just to make sure it's out there: Penn State is banned from the Death to the BCS Playoffs due to their prioritization of football over the welfare of children. Were they eligible, the Nittany Lions probably would earn an at large berth thanks to their high Playoff Points totals and strong computer rankings. But this is a permanent ban, and as tempted as I was along to line to rescind the ban, there is absolutely no reason to take back a ban thanks to the cult atmosphere in State College.

Now that I'm off my soapbox, that will do it for all Week 12 content. Tomorrow I'll have a look at the Week 13 schedule. For most conferences, it's the final week of games before the conference championship game, but for a couple there are two weeks of games left. I'll have more on that tomorrow.